


I Have Loved the Stars Too Fondly to be Fearful of the Night

by SlytherinDemigod18



Series: Rewrite - Past Memories [1]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Adopted Sibling Relationship, BAMF Canada (Hetalia), Blood and Violence, Brothers America & Canada (Hetalia), Canada is Vinland, Changing Tenses, Chibi Canada (Hetalia), Complicated Relationships, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, F/M, FACE Family, Family Feels, Fluff and Angst, Français | French, Historical, Historical Accuracy, Historical Hetalia, Historical Inaccuracy, Historical References, Human & Country Names Used (Hetalia), I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I prefer to call it creative liberties, I reject your canon and make my own, Immortality, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Minor Canada/Prussia (Hetalia), Minor Character Death, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Papa France (Hetalia), Period Typical Attitudes, Poor Canada (Hetalia), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, References to Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, References to Norse Religion & Lore, Rewrite, Slow To Update, Tags May Change, Temporary Character Death, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Violence, and so is america, because I'm awful at grammar even though I got a 96 in ap english, original colony characters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-23
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:33:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 13
Words: 34,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26055010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SlytherinDemigod18/pseuds/SlytherinDemigod18
Summary: Matthew loved the stars.They had always been there, and they always would. They had seen him thrive in his highest points and fall slowly, agonizingly, to his lowest. Empires had risen and fallen as the stars stood silently over them like sentinels in the night, immortal in the depths of mankind's imagination. They were the keepers of long-forgotten secrets, of stories scarcely told.Matthew loved the stars because they were like him.Or:Matthew's been alive for more than a thousand years. He's seen far too much, died far too often, and yet he's still there.
Relationships: Canada/Prussia (Hetalia), Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Series: Rewrite - Past Memories [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1891411
Comments: 25
Kudos: 105
Collections: Historical Fic





	1. Eternity is the Night Sky

**Author's Note:**

> So... it's been almost three years since I posted Past Memories for the first time. A lot has happened since then. I graduated high school (does it count as graduating if you don't get a ceremony and diploma because of the pandemic???), and I'm set to start my first semester of university soon. Basically, I was rereading some of my old works and realized what absolute trash my writing was back then, and I challenged myself to do better. 
> 
> I decided to rewrite Past Memories because I'm actually going in to history as my undergrad and I've come a long way in my research and writing style. I was going to wait until I had the entire thing finished to post it, but I'm starting uni in two weeks and I don't know how often I'll be able to write. Updates will be pretty consistent until I run out of content and have to start writing it when I have time.
> 
> Basically, enjoy!
> 
> (Also, biggest thanks to my grandmother for being my editor even though she doesn't understand fan fiction and hates history)

If someone were to ask Canada what his favourite thing about the world was, he would have to choose the stars. 

For as long as he can remember, the stars were there. From the moment he first opened his eyes, to the day he left home for the first time and the world was shattered, the stars were always there to watch over him in the night. They were the one constant thing about his existence.

And yet he knew that was not true. Everything he saw was an illusion, thrown across time and space, riding on the final triumphant rays of a star, dead and dying across thousands of years only for its legacy to shine brilliantly in the inky blackness of space.

Immortal as long as they shone in the night sky, forgotten the moment their light fades.

Canada liked stars, because they were like him. He, too, would be a beacon of light in the darkness of mortality, a rock holding steady in the storm-swept seas of history. And he, too, would never know when or how the end would come except that one day he would just… cease to exist, what he once was only a footnote in the vastness of the universe.

He had seen it happen before. Children caught up in things bigger than they would ever understand, gone before they’d ever really existed. Adults who’d lived their lives but always craved _more_ , with wishes and dreams left unfilled as society got in the way. He’d seen Nations burn up in an instant, too. The dying breaths of a being who’d never known what it was to fear mortality. The ghosts of his friends would haunt him forever.

But the stars, they shone uncaring through the night sky. Canada knew that he could look up and see the same sky he’d been looking at his whole life. He could almost pretend that he didn’t know that the stars would one day disappear.

_It helped him pretend that he wouldn’t, too._

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


Matthew _{not Canada, not yet}_ blew into the world on a cold night breeze that only hinted of the gale hiding in its wake, the elder twin to the prince of a yet-unknown empire. Full of hidden strength and lethal calm, much of his youth was spent hidden away from his world, safe inside uncharted territory Europeans had only once dared to roam. He and his brother were something _new_ , something not entirely like their half-brothers and sisters.

They had always looked different from them, from the Nations that were their mother’s oldest children. Their skin was fair and pale, their eyes light and swirling with the reflections of a thousand galaxies. 

Matthew and Alfred, though their names had been different, back then, never knew their father. From what their mother told them, they looked like him - had his hair and Alfred had his eyes _{Matthew’s looked so similar to the child he’d brought with him}_ , but they were, in every other way, their mother’s sons. They had her strong cheekbones and her long lashes, but she’d also darkened their skin from snow-pale to a light tan.

And they were beautiful. When they were born, their siblings, Nations who’d lived together for so long they no longer felt the same familial bond they once had, called a temporary truce as they gathered to welcome their new brothers into the world.

_Soaring Eagle_ , she’d called Alfred.

Matthew, she named _Silent Warrior_.

Matthew never really knew who his father was. Sometimes, when his mother thought they were asleep, she’d look toward the stars and quietly tell the tale of their naming, not knowing her sons were listening. 

_Skandia_ , she called the man who, in another time, if they were someone else, might have been their father - their _true_ father. _And his son, Ísland. They stayed for only a short while - a few winters at most. He was proud of you, so proud, but they couldn’t stay._ She ran her fingers through Matthew’s soft curls. He had gotten the wave in his hair from Skandia, but Alfred’s hair had always been straight and messy.

Right from the beginning, Matthew and Alfred knew they weren’t human. They lived far longer but aged far slower. Even after decades they still possessed the bodies of toddlers, despite the knowledge that accumulated in brains far too aged for their appearance. Once, when they’d begged and pleaded with their mother, she sat them down and told them who, and what, exactly, they were.

_You were born as the Children of Vinland_ , she explained. _Together, you make up what was once a single colony, now lost to dust. When your father and his men left, I feared you would disappear, but here you stand today._

Tears brimmed in her eyes as she said that. They didn’t understand yet what she meant - wouldn’t understand for hundreds more years. They didn’t know that their mother was slowly giving up her domain to them so that her youngest children might live. They didn’t know that with each passing decade, she grew weaker and weaker as her sons absorbed her immortality and shaped it as their own.

They never understood that with each passing season spent frolicking around in fields of wildflowers and snow, their mother stepped farther into the shadowy place where Nations went when they died.

_Look to the sky, child,_ she suddenly said one night as they lay beside a crackling fire. The crisp autumn air fanned the flames higher, sending sparks snapping into the inky expanse above, the closest thing the ground would ever have to stars of its own. _That star there - no, not that one, Soaring Eagle -_ that _one, right to the north, the brightest star in the sky. That is where our kind goes when we finally lay down to rest. One day, I will journey across the stars myself and you - you, my children, will be the harbingers of a new age._

Matthew curled into her warmth. He didn’t know, at the time, that their mother knew her days were numbered, that she would soon have to cede her position for them. It had happened to all the greats: Ancient Rome for the Italies, Britannica for her children, Iberia for Portugal and Spain. And she, the mother of the New World, had lasted longer than most. 

_{Matthew didn’t know that she could already feel the invasions that had begun farther south. He didn’t know that her children, the Aztec, Incan, and Mayan empires - the siblings he’d never gotten to meet - had fallen beyond salvation. He didn’t know that, at that moment, they were already gone, killed by greed and the conquest for gold. He didn’t know that their legacies were trapped in tiny children just as he and his brother were their mother’s. He wouldn’t know any of this until centuries later, when he met Mexico for the first time}._

Instead, Matthew snuggled closer, sighing contentedly as she wrapped an arm around him and Alfred. _But not soon, right?_ He asked, half-asleep.

She just brushed the hair out of his eyes and smiled sadly.

When Matthew woke up, Alfred was gone.

_{He’d wandered away in the middle of the night, following something subconscious in his mind that led to a green-eyed man and the commencement of an empire.}_

His mother wiped away his tears as she had done her own and put on a brave smile. _Be brave, Silent Warrior_ . _Someone waits for you, too. Not now, but soon._ She rose from her crouch, letting her hand linger on his small shoulder. _Come, we must leave now_.

Matthew thought that even after Alfred had left _{abandoned him without a goodbye or even an explanation}_ , his mother would always be there for him. 

He was proven wrong when the ship sailed up the river.


	2. Fear Not For the Future, Weep Not For the Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know the discover of Canada didn't quite work like this in real life and involved a lot more comings and goings and failed settlements, but I'm lazy and claim artistic licence.

When his mother placed him in the arms of his sister, Silent Warrior thought nothing of it. She would often leave him with one of her other children while she travelled great distances, explaining that it was too far for a child to roam. He thought nothing of it when his mother and sister hugged each other tightly and for longer than they ever had. Silent Warrior didn’t realize anything was wrong until he was snatched up by the blue-eyed man at the river.

Silent Warrior didn’t know that he would never see his mother again. He didn’t know that she had entrusted him to his sister, one of the nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, so that she could fade as she had come into the world - completely alone. Silent Warrior didn’t know that his mother’s tears were from the pain she was in as her immortality left her body. He didn’t know that the last thing she would see was the sky, tears slipping out of her eyes as a puff of gold was blown out on her final breath. He didn’t know that this was her sacrifice to him: dying so her youngest sons could live.

If he had known that, he might have held on tighter, might have shed tears, might have thanked her for  _ everything she had done for him _ .

But he didn’t know. 

He didn’t understand why he suddenly got a chill that crept down his spine, why he suddenly glowed gold and his body  _ hurt _ as everything snapped into place.

Silent Warrior didn’t know why his sister started crying when she saw him.

He didn’t realize that he’d just felt the death of a Nation, and came into his own _ because _ of it.

_ {It wasn’t until he saw Soaring Eagle again that he realized what had happened that day - that he realized  _ why _ they hadn’t disappeared when Vinland fell}. _

He didn’t realize because he didn’t know their kind  _ could _ die. It had never occurred to him why his mother stopped talking and looked to the distance when he asked about his siblings far to the south.

So Silent Warrior never gave it a second thought. When the ship sailed up the river, he ran to meet it, having never seen  _ anything _ like it before. He didn’t know why his sister was so wary of the men that disembarked or why she demanded that he stay out of sight.

But he was a curious child and slipped out of the village the first chance he got.

The man who met him at the river bank was tall and had hair even lighter than Silent Warrior’s. His eyes were blue, too, but not the same as Soaring Eagle’s - more the colour of a clear sky than a deep river. 

When he caught sight of him, the man’s eyes widened. He made noises with his mouth that Silent Warrior couldn’t understand but assumed were words. Silent Warrior just tilted his head, bemused and curious over this tall man who spoke this language nothing he’d ever heard and seemed to possess a god-like nature that he’d only ever seen in his siblings. Finally, seemingly understanding that Silent Warrior didn’t understand him, the man gestured around to the village he’d come from.

_ Oh, _ Silent Warrior realized.  _ He doesn’t know where he is. _

“Kanata,” he supplied.  _ Our village.  _ “Québec _. _ ”  _ Where the river narrows. _

The man made a happy noise and beckoned to another, repeating what Silent Warrior had said with flourished hand movements. 

The man spoke again and pointed to Silent Warrior, then to himself. “ _ François. _ ” 

Silent Warrior blinked.

“Silent Warrior,” he said after a moment’s hesitation.

But the man -  _ François  _ \- frowned and shook his head. Without warning he scooped Silent Warrior up in his arms and cradled him close to his chest. “ _ Matthieu _ ,” he said.

That’s how Silent Warrior became  _ Matthieu _ , son of  _ la Nouvelle France _ , and how he would soon come to be known as  _ Matthew _ , personification of the British colony of Canada.

As the man carried him away, Silent Warrior didn’t notice his sister crying in the background, weeping for the loss of her younger brother, for the child her mother had entrusted to her. 

_ {And if Silent Warrior noticed and asked François about it, and the man lied to him, well, he didn’t know any better}. _

  
  



	3. We Live In the Gaps Between Stories

As Silent Warrior slowly became Matthieu, Kanata evolved into the colony of _la Nouvelle France_. Matthieu watched as ships full of men sailed off into the great expanse of ocean between France and his homeland. 

François had taken it upon himself to teach Matthieu French in the darkness of their cabin aboard _l’Émérillon_ and by the time they arrived at François' home in Versailles, Matthieu was proficient enough to understand the generality of what was happening in a conversation. He wasn’t bilingual by any means, but François was delighted by his progress.

_You could call me_ papa _, if you want_ , François said one night as he tucked Matthieu into bed. The blankets were heavy around his shoulders and the flickering light of the candle reminded him _just_ enough of campfires that he could sleep easily. _That is a word I have not yet taught you. It means father. A father, Matthieu, is someone who loves you and cares for you unconditionally. That is what I would like to be for you, if you will let me._

Was that what Skandia had been to Matthieu and Soaring Eagle in those precious fews moments they’d had together? Matthieu wished he remembered Skandia, but the only things he had were the stories he overheard when his mother thought he was asleep, and the amulet Skandia had given them when they were born. 

It was an amulet half, designed to be fit together to achieve completion, and smithed from the first metal Matthieu had ever seen, supposedly from the blade of Skandia’s own seax. Inlaid in the iron were the heads of two gods, one for each half of the amulet. Matthieu’s half had Magni _{strength}_ while Soaring Eagle’s had Modi _{bravery}_ , the brothers who were destined to inherit Mjolnir after Ragnarok. That was all his mother had ever told him and Matthieu suspected that was all she ever knew. 

_Strength and Bravery, inheritors of the new world, survivors of the fall of the old._

François had frowned when he saw Matthieu’s amulet, but did not try to take it from him and for that Matthieu was grateful. So maybe he would let this new man become his father, replace the one who had never been there for him, and maybe Matthieu would grow under his guidance and careful tutelage. 

_I think_ , Matthieu whispered in a small voice that echoed in the vastness of his room. _I think I would like it if you were my_ papa.

François smiled and blew out the light. _Then I shall see you in the morning_ , mon fils.

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


It was many months before Matthieu dared think about Soaring Eagle. He was ashamed to say he’d forgotten, caught up in the reveraly that came with being a part of the French court. It was fun - there was music and books _{Matthieu found out he_ loved _books}_ and hundreds of new foods for him to try, but very soon it became apparent that something was missing. 

He _missed_ Soaring Eagle. He missed his laugh and the way his eyes sparkled when he had an idea that was bound to get them into trouble. He missed the way the palm of his brother’s hand fit perfectly into his own as they pulled each other up the branches of the trees that towered high above the water. Most of all, Matthieu missed the comfortable familiarity that he’d had with Soaring Eagle, how they could gaze up at the night sky without saying a word and yet know exactly what the other was thinking.

It wasn’t to say that he didn’t like François, but the man was still new to him. Perhaps, in time Matthieu would find a similar connection with this Nation who had become his father, but not yet, not so soon.

“ _Papa_?” Matthieu tugged on the puffy sleeves of François’ doublet. His father-figure was speaking to another important man - a dignitary? A lord? - in the rapid-fire French Matthieu still had trouble following.

“Please, excuse me for just a moment.” François sent the other man an apologetic smile that seemed to also convey his annoyance and an invitation to his bed. He turned to Matthieu. “ _Qu’est-ce qui ne va pas,_ Matthieu? The nurse should have tucked you in long ago, it’s past your bedtime.”

The dignitary - for that was what Matthieu decided he was - had the courtesy to pretend he wasn’t listening, despite the bewilderment clearly plastered on his face.

Matthieu knew he confused people. He confused himself sometimes, too. He’d been counting and he’d been _la Nouvelle France_ for a little over a hundred years, but he’d hardly aged. Except, he’d recently gone through a growth spurt and now that he was a least a foot taller and several years older, the nightgown that had fit him only months before was now resting just below his knobbly knees. Secretly, Matthieu was pleased as that meant he was growing stronger and would soon be able to practice lessons that were more befitting of boys his age.

_{He was getting frustrated being confined to his nursery all the time. Yes, he understood he still had the body of a small child and yes, he knew that his appearance was difficult to explain, but there was a whole other world outside the walls of François’ estate that Matthieu wanted to explorer}._

Explorer the world like he’d done with Soaring Eagle before he’d vanished.

“I miss my brother,” Matthieu whispered, clutching his blanket around his shoulders like a cape. Over top of the nightgown, his amulet shone in the light of the crystal chandelier. 

François frowned and knelt before Matthieu on the polished wooden floor. “You have never mentioned a brother before, _mon petit_.”

“I know, it’s just - well, I -” Matthieu’s voice began to tremble as he stumbled over his words. “He’s like me and he left without saying goodbye and I really miss him, and, I - I was hoping you might be able to help me find him?”

His voice turned up in a hopeful question at the end.

“Of course I’ll help you find him,” François smiled softly. “Do you have any idea what happened? Is there anything you can tell me about him - a name, perhaps? Then I can look into having him brought to Versailles.”

Matthieu didn’t know how to translate his brother’s name into French - or even if François would understand what he was saying if he did. “We’re twins an’ he’s got blond hair, like me, but blue eyes like you, and a funny piece of hair at the front of his head that never wants to stay flat.”

François’ eyebrows furrowed, but Matthieu pressed on, eyes shining with excitement. 

“He left not long before you found me. My-” Matthieu hesitated. Was he supposed to tell François about his mother? François was now his father and Matthieu didn’t like keeping secrets from him, but Matthieu’s last father had hurt her in ways he couldn’t even begin to imagine, and Matthieu wasn’t quite certain if François could be trusted with the information just yet. “Someone was waiting for him down in his land - south of mine. That’s how I knew someone was going to come for me - because someone had already come for him.”

François cursed so foully that Matthieu thought he might have to spend a week in the chapel repenting for even _hearing_ those words. “Your brother,” François’ voice dropped to a low growl. It wasn’t directed at him, but it made Matthieu uneasy all the same. “Is now the colony of my enemy. While you are under my control, you will _not_ be going near him. Do you understand me?”

Something cold slithered down his spine. Matthieu nodded his head frantically even as his heart clenched so tightly it ached. Looking at his father, seeing the anger he’d awoken, he was sorry he asked. He wrapped the blanket tighter around his shoulders and dropped his gaze to the floor. 

“Come, now,” François said, tilting Matthieu’s chin up to look him in the eye. “I didn’t mean to frighten you, _mon cher_. _Monsieur_ _le Compte de Bussy_ , please excuse me, but I have to retire now,” he turned to the spluttering man he’d been speaking to before. “I hope to continue this conversation some other time.”

Without another word, he lifted Matthieu up and headed for the grand staircase. Matthieu snuggled against his warm chest, desperately trying to ignore the sting in his eyes. “Will you tell me a story, _papa_?”

François smiled down at the child in his arms, his tense demour from before relaxing into something soft and caring. “Have I ever told you the one about the Battle of Hasting?”


	4. Omens of a Star Fall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Starting now, really, the chapters start varying in length. It really depended on when I felt was a good place to split up the text and end the writing (otherwise there would have been, like, three chapters of 20k each and I was not doing that).

Matthieu returns to his country after more than a hundred years in Versailles and doesn’t recognize it at all. 

Gone are the green meadows, and the silent forests, and the cloudless blue skies. He could no longer hear the bird calls and the whispers of the wind through the long grasses of the hillside. Instead, smoke rises from the hundred chimneys of a stone-walled city. The air, which had once been so clear and so still Matthieu could _taste_ the stardust in the wake of the night, was now ashy bitter, like the air of Paris was. 

And Matthieu _hated_ it. The _one_ place he’d thought would remain constant in his life, the _one_ place Matthieu dreamt softly of in his dreams, the _one_ place he’d learned love and longing, acceptance and rejection, peace and warfare, was _gone_. 

He stood on the docks at the _Port du Québec_ , frozen in place as he took in the landscape that had once been his home. The long grasses of the plains had been razed short to the ground, earth packed and cobbles inlaid in the narrow paths that wound between the cramped buildings of the city. The wispy clouds that had once graced the cobalt sky were now replaced by great expanses of canvas as the sails in the harbour stood proudly unfurled, like the wings of proud birds that flew in on the winds of change.

Matthieu spent the walk from the port to their new house in a daze. The heels of Matthieu’s shoes clicked on the cobbles beneath his feet. The city was abuzz with noise, carts rambling down adjoining streets, colonials bustling about their day, the nickering of horses as they waited for their masters outside taverns and shops. Matthieu briefly entertained the idea of stopping to pet the beautiful bay tied on a post nearby, but François put a hand on his shoulder and moved him along.

François stopped them outside a small two-story on the corner of _la Rue de Meulles_. The sandy mortar that held the stones together sparkled in the afternoon light. “I had this commissioned when we were in Versailles,” François explained, gently nudging Matthieu forward until he reached the steps. “I thought it was time we returned to the colony.”

He says it simply, an offhand explanation that would be taken for the truth by any other boy. But Matthieu was the son of the French aristocracy, a child-Nation who grew up in the royal courts of Versailles. He heard things people never knew he had. He knew all the hiding places in the palace, all the niches and false panels that he could tuck himself away in and no one would be any the wiser that he was there.

Matthieu _knows_ that François isn’t telling him the full truth about why they’re there, just as he knows that tensions have been increasing between his father-country, and Britain and Prussia. He isn’t blind; he’s seen the bags under his father’s eyes that have formed in the past few months. He’s heard the shouting behind the closed doors of the palace. He’s seen the documents and plans that are hastily covered when he enters the room. 

Matthieu is no longer a child, but people keep treating him like he is. If he was a normal, mortal boy, Matthieu reflects, he would have already joined the workforce, or, if he was lucky enough to be the child of the nobility like he currently is, would have already undergone the commencement of his courtly training - his tutors, his father, preparing him to inherit his family’s estate. If Matthieu had remained with his mother and his brother _{don’t think about him - no, don’t think about the what ifs and might have beens}_ and their siblings, he would be free, no longer a bird trapped in a gilded cage. He could do whatever he wanted, _be_ whoever he wanted to be. He could have continued to explore the land with his brother, racing, _daring_ to see what lay beyond the frozen plains of the north and the dry mountains of the south. Perhaps, in another life, Matthieu would never have had to see his family fall apart, their fragile relationship fracturing at the seams until it shattered completely. In another life, he might have been blissfully happy, raised to manhood in the loving arms of his mother, gentle kisses pressed to his brow by his sisters, and his brothers holding him tight to chase the nightmares away.

Perhaps this would have been Matthieu’s life if he had been born in a different place, at a different time, to different parents who had _stayed_ . But those dreams would never be and Matthieu was now the colony of _la Nouvelle France_ , no longer a child standing in his mother’s shadow. 

So Matthieu would walk up the steps to his new home and not think about the circumstances that led him there. He would forget about the sister he’d been entrusted to, he’d forget about lazy days under the summer sun with Soaring Eagle, and the warmth of his mother’s arms around him, and he would concentrate on being his father’s heir. Just as the city of Québec had evolved into one of the most prominent ports in the New World, Matthieu would have to grow as well. He was the last link to the wild days of the world, the legacy of both the old and the new, an ancient soul trapped in the body of a child. He was Magni, strength incarnate in this modern age, and though his twin, the missing half of his soul, was no longer with him, he would ascend to places his father could only ever dream of. Matthieu would build on the legacy François was giving him, but he knew that this colony would someday be _his_ to inherit. François could only hold onto him for so long before he began to clip his wings. 

He would let these stone walls surround his city, protect it just as they were always supposed to, but Matthieu would no longer run from what he was. When the war reached these shores _{and he knew it would; he could smell it on the wind}_ , he would be ready - ready to shape and adapt and morph into whatever his country needed him to be. It would be hard - dear God it would be hard - but Matthieu was a Nation, and life had a funny way of making them pay for their immortality. There would still be time to make memories as Matthieu Bonnefoy, heir presumptive to Lord François Bonnefoy of Versailles - memories more appropriate of a child his age, but the breeze blew in on the wings of War and he could feel a stirring beneath his feet. It was subtle and silent, just a quiet prodding in his mind, an aching in his bones, but it was there. 

Whether he liked it or not, change was coming to Matthieu’s colony, and he desperately hoped he was ready when it came.

He couldn’t explain how he knew, but he did. Something big was creeping toward the French Empire, and Matthieu knew the glory days of Versaille were coming to an end.

_{Even a falling star falls in flames, but the fire it leaves in its wake is the most beautiful of all}_.

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


Matthieu’s favourite part of Québec was the battlements. From atop the stone fortifications, he could see for miles around. From up high, the man-made walls mocking the trees that had once been in their place, he could gaze upon the fields and the forests of the distance, and almost pretend that they hadn’t been won through blood and brutal betrayal. As he gazed across the endless expanse of rolling hills, he could almost pretend that it all belonged to him, that he was the only one of his kind for miles around.

Strictly speaking, Matthieu wasn’t supposed to be on the ramparts in the first place. Only soldiers and the militia were allowed to walk on the stone wall as they made their rounds, and it _certainly_ wasn’t the place for a child. But Matthieu was growing, _flourishing_ under François’ guidance, and as the colony matured, so did he. He was no longer content to stay within the city’s looming walls and he wanted - he _needed_ to see the forests outside Québec, just to remind himself that they were still there. Despite the illegality of it, no soldier dared reprimand him or drag him before the court of law. Matthieu’s father was one of the few nobility in the whole of _la Nouvelle France_ and rumors circulated amongst the guards as to the exact nature of François’ position in the royal court. The soldiers eyed him when they thought he wasn’t looking, perplexed by this eternal-child who spoke softly but with authority, who never seemed to grow older despite the years since he’d begun climbing the ramparts every day, and seemed to know the city and the surrounding countryside like the back of his hand.

So the soldiers turned a blind eye to him, and in return Matthieu sent grateful smiles their way and made an effort to get to know every man. He knew that Henri’s wife was set to give birth in a few weeks _._ He knew that Jean Claude was an old man who hated unnecessary chatter. He knew that Antoine was the newest guard, a young man not much older than Matthieu himself recently arrived from France _._ Another man, a born colonial, would ruffle Matthieu’s curls and predict the weather of the coming days to near perfection.

It was with this man that Matthieu stood on the day War sailed up the Saint-Laurent in the form of the greatest navy the world had ever seen.

It was a day Matthieu would remember long after he became Matthew. The golden fields in the distance had recently been razed and the wheat stooks were mere pin-pricks from the ramparts of the city. The trees had just begun to turn, their leaves a gradient of yellows, reds, and green. François had begun to keep the fire burning at night, letting the warmth from the flickering embers sweep beneath the heavy quilts on Matthieu’s bed to warm the crisp wind that blew gently through the shutters. 

François had been subdued, as of late. More than once, Matthieu woke up in the middle of the night to find his father pouring over letters and documents by candlelight, and François began to look sickly, his pale skin becoming waxy and the bags under his eyes darkening. It worried Matthieu. Once, when François had taken a walk to clear his head, Matthieu opened his desk drawer where he kept all his correspondents from France, and unfolded the letters that had made his father bury his head in his hands. 

They detailed the war in Europe, the victories and losses taken by François’ army and the ever-increasing odds against them. Matthieu dropped the letters, suddenly feeling sick. _Now_ he understood why they left Versailles in such a hurry. He’d known about the war, of course, but it was different when faced with _evidence_ . Matthieu had seen the casualty list, had seen the description of battle tactics, and now he saw a report that the British had captured _l’Île Royale_ and had a clear path directly to the heart of Matthieu’s colony.

He’d tried to put it out of his mind - really, he’d tried, but he found the knowledge invading his dreams. Several times François had shaken him awake and then held him in his arms until he calmed down again because he’d been having frightful nightmares.

Matthieu tried to convince himself that his dreams were foolish. Surely the British, powerful as their navy may be, wouldn’t be so foolish as to attack the walls of Québec, one of the most well-defended cities in the new world. Québec meant _where the river narrows_ in Algonquin, and the city was built on a natural choke-point in the river, rendering the navy near useless and incredibly susceptible to the cannons mounted on the ramparts.

Of course, Matthieu was still new to this form of warfare, with their guns and cannons and ships that harnessed the wind like a bird. If he strained his eyes across the expanse of the river, he could see the smoke trails of the campfires from the British base directly opposite. Already they’d attempted a brief attack on one of Québec City’s upper boroughs _{and hadn’t that given Matthieu an anxiety attack}_ but had been quickly pushed back by the militia. Now, they’d cut off the French’s supply route to Montréal and Matthieu could _feel_ the city teetering on the edge of fear and anticipation and full-out war as the British grew bolder in their movements, hoping to bait them into battle. 

François was trying to hold off confronting the British until Matthieu could be squirreled safely out of the city. He held Matthieu in shaking arms as their window of opportunity closed and the enemy drew closer to their gates. 

Matthieu didn’t even know if he’d be safe if he escaped Québec. Already his body ached as the British rampaged around the surrounding countryside, burning and pillaging the local villages and wrecking the picturesque landscape, miniscule cuts and burns littering his skin every time he woke in the morning only to be gone and healed by nightfall. Though not insignificant by any means, the petty destruction of small villages wasn’t enough to cause lasting damage to Matthieu’s colony, and by proxy, Matthieu himself. A thrill of fear went down Matthieu’s spine at the thought of what would happen if Québec was taken. Would those wounds heal and fade like the others? Or was Québec City of enough magnitude that the consequences and aftermath of the battle would map itself across his pale skin in jagged, puckered scars?

Even though he’d never experienced it himself, save for a small crescent-shaped scar behind his ear from when Vinland fell, Matthieu had seen the scars that criss-crossed across the skin of his siblings and his mother. François was more subtle when it came to the evidence of how his country had clawed its way to power, but sometimes he slipped and the silvery, age-worn scars peeked out beneath the cuffs of his sleeves or beneath the carefully applied makeup dusted across his cheeks. Sometimes, late at night, Matthieu would catch him sitting in front of the fireplace, a snifter of cognac in his shaking hands, and his face looked so much _older_ , his eyes weary and old wounds peeking out of the undone laces of his tunic. 

On nights where Matthieu found François in such a state, he would carefully remove the glass from his father’s grasp, and lead him outside to the courtyard. There, Matthieu would fall asleep with his head resting against François’ chest as the other nation told him stories in a quiet, shaking voice, or sometimes they would just lie in silence under the stars. His tutors had told him the Classical legends behind each of the European constellations, and Matthieu in turn came up with new stories for each of them, each pattern of stars representing another member of his family. 

He and Soaring Eagle were the same constellation, Matthieu had decided. They were Castor and Pollux, Magni and Modi, the twins of the New World. They couldn’t be seperated, no matter the distance between them. Even if Matthieu was on one side of this war and Soaring Eagle on the opposite, they were brothers and nothing could change that.

Except, Matthieu feared, deep down in a part of himself he was ashamed to admit existed, what the decades apart had done to his bond with his brother. François said that Soaring Eagle was in the hands of a cruel, sadistic empire. His bedtime stories had doubled as history lessons as his father ran through every conflict and squabble he’d ever had with _l’Angleterre_ . His older brother - now long-Faded - and his Norman Conquest of Britain, the Hundred Years War, Jeanne d’Arc, the Fall of Calais. And most recently, what had been happening to Acadia. Horror stories of burning houses and children ripped from their parents and women being taken away, never to be seen again replayed in Matthieu’s mind at night. _This_ was the empire Soaring Eagle was currently living in, the legacy he’d first experienced Europe with. It terrified Matthieu to think that his brother, the other half of his soul, might have grown into something he would no longer be able to recognize. 

The man next to him let out a breathless curse that rocked Matthieu back to the present. Glancing at the pale-faced soldier beside him, Matthieu quickly whipped his gaze back to the open plains beside the city and felt all the strength leave his body. 

Redcoats, hundreds of them, marched across the plains straight towards Québec City. They advanced like a tidal wave of crimson, unrelenting and uncaring of anything in its path. Matthieu grabbed onto the wall of the fortifications to keep himself upright as the world swam around him.

_There were so many_. 

There were _so many_. And they were unprepared, no reinforcements in sight and -

Matthieu vaguely registered the words of the man next to him. He was telling Matthieu to go home, he was sure, but Matthieu was rooted to the spot. 

He’d never seen war - not like this. 

War had always been a distant thought - his siblings’ rivalries leading to bloodshed, battles being fought an ocean away, but this was _here_ and it was _real_ . He’d never felt the grit of gunpowder beneath his fingernails, he’d never speared a bayonet through someone’s chest. The most he’d ever done was hold the rifle of a _courier du bois_ , and even then François had been hovering, quick to snatch it away the moment Matthieu turned it to look in the barrel. 

This was different. Matthieu had been growing - growing _up_ \- for _this moment_ . All those nights as his muscles ached as his country matured had been in preparation for _this_. All those nights in Versailles when he played chess with his father. All those lessons his tutors taught him about the victories and defeats of fallen empires, of how the smallest action could tip the balance of fate. 

But this was Matthieu’s colony. He wasn’t _supposed_ to _be_ like those empires of old. The New World was meant to be something different, a second chance for the European powers. They were meant to be the best parts of the Old and the New, learning from mistakes made before their time, and thriving in the peace that François had _promised_ would reign.

“Matthieu.” Matthieu finally tuned into what the soldier was saying. Sweat ran down the man’s brow. “We’ve sounded the warning bell. Go find your father; this is no place for a child.”

Matthieu answered in a daze _{though he wasn’t quite sure_ what _he’d said}_ and stumbled down the steps. Each heartbeat corresponded to the _click_ of his shoes resounding off the weathered stone. He missed one close to the bottom and slipped, scraping his hands and knees when he hit the gravel ground.

The pain shocked him and he sprang to his feet, sprinting down the street. Tears pricked at his violet eyes, and the rocks embedded in his hands and knees _stung_ , but he ran faster - faster than was probably appropriate of an aristocrat's son. But here he wasn’t an aristocrat - not really. He was just a son of _la Nouvelle France_ like every boy born here was. He had no expectations save for the promise of crisp night air and the cool bubbling of the streams in the forest. At that moment, he was just a child, promised an innocent world and instead thrust into a war that had no bearing to him. This was his father’s war, the fight of the generations before. But Matthieu and the children of Québec were meant to be the first in an innocent era, the first who would grow up in this land of new opportunities, of second chances. _This_ was not how the story was supposed to go!

Shouting began to ring through the streets and people ran past him, equally as fevered. In the distance, Matthieu could hear the popping of gunfire and it sent another wave of pain crashing through him. He grit his teeth and stumbled in his stride _. Merde, it hurt_.

Matthieu slowed to a stop in front of his house, the pain finally catching up to him in agonizing pulses that ran through his shuddering body, just as the door was yanked open from the inside and François stepped out. “Matthieu! _Oh mon Dieu!_ What happened to your knees?”

He looked down at the blood that flowed freely from the gashes in his shaking legs. Matthieu knew he should feel _something_ at the sight of the crimson soaking in and staining his creamy stockings, but inside he was just _numb_. 

_Numb_ at the lies and the broken promises of a new tomorrow.

“The British,” he managed to say, though his tongue felt swollen and heavy in his mouth. “They’re here.”

Matthieu remembered nothing more as he collapsed on the porch. He didn’t remember François’ frantic cries or the strong arms that carried him to bed. He didn’t remember the cool cloth that dabbed at his forehead and his father yelling for a doctor, only to be told that _there aren’t any available, monsieur._ He didn’t remember thrashing about and screaming in his sleep, or the way François held him close to his chest, praying for him to stay silent as they were smuggled out of the city.

Matthieu didn’t remember the fall of Québec City or the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, or the chaos that had followed in the aftermath. He didn’t remember, but he was never allowed to forget.

The angry red scar stretching between his left ribs ensured that.

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


When Matthieu woke, it was in a dim room he didn’t recognize. Hushed voices penetrated the silence of the room, though they were so quiet and rushed that he couldn’t understand what they were saying. The room was a harsh mixture of blinding whites and soft, soothing greys and beiges. Women in long robes bustled about stopping beside bedsides to place their hands against foreheads or fill bowls with water. As his vision cleared and the room came into focus, Matthieu realized that the women were nuns and that the beds were occupied, mostly with young men. 

He rolled his tongue over his lips. They were achingly dry and swollen. He turned his head to the side and reached for the small jug of water on the table beside his bed. Or at least, that’s what he tried to do.

When he extended his arm, something in his ribs twinged and sent a spasm of pain through his whole body. With a yelp, Matthieu curled back in on himself, clutching at his throbbing side.

“ _Matthieu!_ ”

That was his father’s voice, and he opened his eyes to see François rush over to his side of the bed and kneel so they were at eye-level.

“ _Papa_ , what -”

“Hush, _mon petit_ ,” François brushed a lock of sweat-dampened hair from Matthieu’s face and turned to pour him a glass of water. “Drink.”

Matthieu accepted the glass gratefully with trembling hands. With François’ help, he managed to sit up against the propped-up pillow. He took careful sips, aware of how the water rolled in his empty stomach.

“Where are we?” he asked at last.

“We’re in Montréal, at _l’Hôtel-Dieu_. Drink it slowly, Matthieu,” he advised. “You’ve been here for several days now, but the sisters are confident you’ll be discharged soon.”

Matthieu hummed, nodding his head, and then abruptly stopping when it made his vision swim. “ _Why_ are we here?” Then the memories of Québec City rushed back and he stiffened, immediately regretting it when the action sent another bolt of pain through his ribs. “What happened - to Québec, I mean.”

François’ fingers stilled where they were carding through Matthieu’s hair. “Don’t worry about it. You’re safe, and that’s all that matters right now.”

Something akin to fear pulsed in Matthieu’s chest. “It’s gone, isn’t it?”

“ _Perdu à l’Anglais_ ,” François admitted with a bitter tone in his voice. 

“But - but _how_?” Matthieu cried desperately. “It was so well defended and they couldn’t use their navy and -”

“Both generals are dead,” François interrupted. “Wolfe in battle and Montcalm soon after.”

“Oh,” Matthieu’s heart plummeted. François’ words confirmed the aching suspicion he’d had the moment he woke up. He’d seen it in his dreams, but had hoped to God that it wasn’t true. 

“You cried out his last words in your sleep.” François continued, clearing his throat and rubbing his red-rimmed eyes. “‘ _Tant mieux! Je ne vivrai pas pour voir la capitulation du Québec_ .’ Matthieu, you - you _scared_ me.”

“I’m sorry, _papa_ .” A lump formed in Matthieu’s throat. Gone was his home in the New World, now forced to fly the flag of the British instead of their own _fleur-de-lis_. His eyes grew heavy as he thought of the damage sustained by his city. One bitterly triumphant thought was that the British had no idea the hell that was coming in the form of the Canadian winter.

  
“You have nothing to be sorry for, _mon cher_ ,” François continued to brush his fingers through Matthieu’s hair. “We will take it back. Now sleep. I’ll be here when you wake.”


	5. The Earth Is Littered With the Ruins of Empires That Believed Themselves Immortal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I believe this is where my grandmother stopped editing for me, so any mistakes after this are my own.

Through the foggy glass of a nearby window, Matthieu could see the stars. They shone on, infinitely bright against an indigo sky, like the final, crackling sparks of the fire ships trapped in eternity in the great expanse of space. Matthieu wished he was a star, forever running the same course, never knowing the pain of chance. His tears fell down his cheeks like the ruins of a thousand galaxies clinging to what they once were.

It was over now. Everything was over.

Was  _ this _ what the end of an era felt like? Was  _ this _ was his kind was doomed to do - to change their entire beings to support the fanciful wishes of humans? It  _ ached _ deep in his bones, somewhere primal and unforgiving, that need to forget what he once was and change to what he could be. Matthieu wondered how many times this had happened to his  _ papa _ , to his brothers and sisters, to his mother, to the father-that-could-have-been and the child who’d followed along in his shadow.

Matthieu tugged at a loose thread at his collar. Beneath his crisp white button up and the slightly rumpled light blue overcoat was a bandage. Two scars lay beneath it, one between his ribs, one slicing across his gut, both puckered and shiny and  _ sore _ . Careful balms were applied regularly, but just as his colony hadn’t recovered, neither had he. Montréal and Québec City, both forever marring his skin, never letting him forget how he failed his people.

It had been three years, but they still pulsed and stretched with every move he made, threatening to open in retaliation. Three years, and Matthieu still needed ointments and salves to numb the pain. François had said it would likely remain that way until the war ended and the state of his country improved. 

Matthieu could see that the years were taking a similar toll on his father. His skin was waxy and wan, dark circles under his eyes that deepened with each passing week. Matthieu wasn’t even sure he was sleeping. Sometimes, Matthieu would slip out of bed to get a glass of water, only to find his father in his study, pouring over an endless pile of documents, or sitting in front of the fire, a half-empty bottle of alcohol of some sort on the table beside him, and François sitting motionless in his armchair, his head in his hands. 

Matthieu had known, even then, what that meant. He’d stayed silent, hoping to God that it wasn't true, that his father  _ {his fearless, undefeatable  _ papa _ }  _ would manage to win the war, that he had some sort of hidden alliance - a proverbial ace up his sleeve, of sorts - or long-forgotten magic he could call upon.

He knew it was silly; magic only existed in fables and the myths of old. But as he sat outside the office, in a rickety wooden chair that looked as though it could collapse any minute, he wished that magic  _ did _ exist. There would be a solution to everything, mankind would want for nothing, and perhaps his  _ papa _ and his enemies could put aside their differences and learn to  _ live _ . Perhaps magic would be able to seal the wounds along his torso permanently, chase away infection and ensure that no scar remained to mar his pristine skin. But magic didn’t exist and there was no easy solution to the situation they found themselves in, and he shouldn’t pretend otherwise.

_ {He ignored the faint memories of a long-forgotten time. Of brothers who showed him the Spirits that danced in the Northern Lights. Of sisters who watched as the smoke from the ceremonial fires formed shapes and told the future. Of the legends of Magni and Modi and how, when he clutched his amulet, he could almost believe them to be true.} _

Matthieu could hear yelling coming from the wall behind him, and he let his head fall back against the cool wood paneling. Everything smelled like ash and soot, now. Even though the fighting in Québec had ended almost three years before, the haunting echoes of the war seemed to have seeped into the worn wooden panelling. His clean, pale blue skeleton suit was trimmed in gold thread - an utterly fanciful waste in the current predicament they found themselves in. The only thing out of place in his outfit were the shoes he wore, a size too small and scuffed with stone dust and dirt. There hadn’t been time to fashion him a new pair when he’d woken up one morning to find that he’d grown, seeing as leather was in short supply. 

He shifted in his seat, grumbling internally at the way the jacket pinched his newly-broadened shoulders. François had told him to wait outside while he and several other men discussed important war matters in the office. It irked Matthieu slightly that he wasn’t allowed in, but as he listened to the voices increase in volume from behind thick oak doors, he was suddenly glad to not have people yelling in his face.

Then the voices died down to a murmur and Matthieu turned to press his ear against the wall, attempting in vain to hear what had caused the argument to fizzle out so suddenly. There were hushed noises, but no more yelling, and the clinking of glasses, as though the Nations inside had stopped to have a drink.

Matthieu licked his cracked lips. He wished he had a glass of water to slake his thirst, but all the servants that had previously occupied the building were now gone, and Matthieu didn’t know what happened to them. 

Suddenly, his body gave an involuntary shudder - no more than a twitch, but it was wracked with pain. Matthieu’s breathing sped up as his heart beat faster, the searing pain rushing through his bones - his very  _ soul _ \- beginning to crescendo. 

The scream that ripped from his throat was nothing short of agonizing. It tore at his lungs, at the absence of air he was able to breath in, and scraped the back of his throat raw. It was the scream of a grieving mother, the final battle cry of a wounded soldier, the last call of prey as they know they’re being stalked in the night. Hot, salty tears stung his eyelids and slid like raging rivers down his cheeks. 

Matthieu’s entire body was on  _ fire _ . It seared through his veins and his bones and lit explosives behind his eyelids. His body seized again and he fell off the chair, both him and it crashing to the ground. There was screaming in the background that Matthieu would only realize much later was coming from him.

Then, as suddenly as it came on, the pain disappeared, leaving Matthieu gasping on the ground, his bones aching and his lungs fluttering as he tried to breath. He curled in on himself, coughing, and noticed in a haze the thick pool of dark blood that slowly grew bigger beneath his right arm.

_ Oh _ , he thought with a hysterical sort of giggle,  _ I’ve been hurt. _

Slowly, reality came back to him. First it was the smell - the coppery tang of fresh blood and the lingering smell of soot coming from the walls. And then it was the feeling of the sticky, blood-slick wooden floor he was lying on, and the wall opposite him slowly came back into focus. Last was his hearing, which still rang slightly in his ears, but now he could make out the muffled voices in François’ office.

Matthieu wasn’t even sure they’d stopped talking when they heard him scream - though they surely must have heard, for it echoed in Matthieu’s own ears. They certainly didn’t come out to investigate, and, for some reason, that knowledge made something deep within him ache.

He’d known he wasn’t François’ only colony. He knew it just as he knew that he was  _ la Nouvelle France _ . François would leave, sometimes for months, once or twice for a year, as he visited his other colonies, leaving Matthieu behind in the care of his nurses and tutors. 

He’d  _ known _ that, but somehow he’d managed to convince himself that François loved him most. He was the only one who lived with him in Versailles, François had built him a house in Québec City and  _ stayed _ there with him, and Matthieu was  _ sure _ he was one of the few who called the Nation  _ papa _ .

And yet François hadn’t come out when he’d heard Matthieu screaming.

Tears poured down his cheeks with renewed vigor, but Matthieu couldn’t even muster up the energy to wipe them away. His arms were heavy -  _ so heavy _ , and he felt like he could sleep for a week. 

There was a low groan as the doors to the office opened and three men stepped out. One of them was his  _ papa _ , another was tanned and had dark hair and the biggest axe Matthieu had ever seen strapped to his back, and the last was blond with green eyes and  _ enormous _ eyebrows.

“Get up, Matthieu,” François said, his voice frigid, not sparing a glance to the boy lying on the ground or the blood oozing from his arm.

Matthieu tried to hide his whimpers as he pushed himself into a sitting position.

“Have we come to an agreement?” The man with the eyebrows asked, speaking in the universal language of the Nations.

“You already know we have,  _ connard _ ,” François spat. “He’s yours.  _ La Nouvelle France _ officially belongs to the British.”

“ _ Papa _ ?” Matthieu asked in a trembling voice. He shakily rose to his feet, his hand clenched around his right bicep, trying to stem the blood flow. “What’s - I don’t understand? What’s going-?”

François cut him off before he could finish his sentence. “You weren’t worth trying to keep.” His voice was aloof and distance, his eyes cold and hard. “You belong to the British now.”

The dark-haired man gave a small cough, perhaps in surprise, but said nothing.

Matthieu’s world was collapsing around him. He’d often wondered if there was something about him that made everyone leave. First it was his sire and his other child, gone before Matthieu even got to know them. Then it was his brothers and sisters, driven apart by pride and human grudges. Then his brother, his  _ twin _ , left without a word, not saying goodbye or even trying to contact him in the decades that followed. His mother left him alone and never came back, and he didn’t know what happened to the sister she’d entrusted him to. And now his father - his  _ true _ father - was leaving and seemingly couldn’t care less about him.

Matthieu’s knees went weak and time slowed as he stumbled after François, trying to catch his coat tails, only to be snatched up by the man with the eyebrows and held tightly against his chest in a hold Matthieu couldn’t break.

_ “Papa! _ ” Matthieu cried as his vision became watery once more. “Please, I don’t understand!”

The man holding him called François’ name and he stopped, already half-way down the hallway. 

“Be good, Matthieu,” François said, not turning around to look at him. “I raised you to be a gentleman, prove to me that I shouldn’t have done otherwise.”

With that he continued down the hall, the heels of his boots echoing hauntingly in the ruins of the place he’d once ruled.

  
Matthieu  _ screamed _ .


	6. Time Takes a Cigarette and Puts It In Your Mouth

In the silence of his cabin, Matthieu could hear the waves lapping against the hull. He sat curled up in his hammock, tucked away in the corner farthest from the stairs that led to the door. It was a large cabin, much larger than the ones he’d seen on his way in, but still cramped in the way that all dark, dank rooms were. Pushed against the wall opposite him was a single bed, with a dresser at its foot and a table in the center of the room. It was nice enough, Matthew supposed, but he didn’t have the energy to care. 

The hammock had been brought to him by a kind-faced Midshipman who’d hung it up and then asked him a question he didn't understand, before frowning and leaving the cabin only to return a few minutes later with a pillow and a thick woolen blanket. 

Matthieu was thankful for this stranger’s kindness. The Nation who’d brought him onto the ship hadn’t paid him a second glance before leaving him in the darkness of the cabin and returning to the deck. That didn’t bother Matthieu very much; he needed time to process what had happened only hours before.

In the span of mere seconds, everything Matthieu had known had been destroyed. It seemed the only thing he was destined for was to be cast aside and forgotten the moment he ceased to be useful. 

Skandia had left him the moment the colony began to fail, left him with only an amulet and an impossible legend to live up to. His brothers and sisters began to push him away as they became caught up in their animosities, uncaring that he wanted to be neutral, that he wanted to love them just the same. Soaring Eagle vanished the second some man arrived on his shores, promising fame and fortune. His mother handed him off to another sibling without any final words, any final goodbyes, without letting him know that _she was dying and couldn’t Matthieu see that everything she’d done had been for him?_ The sister, he’d never seen again, and he had no idea what had happened to her - if she still lived or if she’d Faded like the Ancients François had told him about.

Bitter bile rose in Matthieu’s throat as he thought about François. 

The man had promised to be the father Matthieu had never had, to be there for every moment and guide him on his path to becoming the most powerful colony in the French Empire. He promised to _love_ him and _protect_ him, and he’d just _thrown him away_. 

Thrown him away the moment he became too expensive, too big, too much trouble to deal with. As though a child was something one could cast aside upon changing their ideas toward parenting. As though _Matthieu_ was expendable, no more than a pawn on the chessboard of life, where the empires reigned king and Matthieu was just a necessary sacrifice to fall into checkmate.

But that was _exactly_ what Matthieu was. He didn’t know why he’d been fooling himself for all those years. François had only kept him because the trade had been useful, not because he’d truly cared for Matthieu. If he had, he wouldn’t have left him lying in a pool of his own blood.

Matthieu’s mother had said he could be the harbinger of a new age, he just hadn’t realized it was the age of Loneliness and the Forgotten. Just like the frozen winds of his winter nights, everything he touched withered and died, and he was left alone. No matter what happened, no matter the road he took, the circumstances that brought him to his destination, he would always end up here: alone and cast aside, a child living in the shadow of legends.

He sniffled and wiped his nose with his sleeve, a frozen sort of anger pooling in his chest. He would shed no more tears for François, for the life he might have had. It was over now, and there was nothing Matthieu could do to change it. 

Scrubbing the tears from his eyes, Matthieu reached into the pocket of his trousers and pulled out his amulet. He ran his fingers over Magni’s metal face, smoothed down slightly from centuries of doing so. It was a comforting gesture, almost unconsciously done whenever he was in distress. Matthieu didn’t know _why_ it calmed him, only that it did. It made a rush of warmth flow through his chest, easing the knots in his tense shoulders and letting air flow unencumbered through his lungs.

Someone knocked at the door, and then, without waiting for Matthieu’s answer, eased it open. 

It was the man from before, the one who’d taken him away. Matthieu curled back farther in his hammock and glared at the Nation in the darkness of the cabin. 

He set a tray of food down on the table, then turned to Matthieu. “What’s your name, boy?”

Matthieu glared at the man and remained silent. Though the man spoke the universal language of the Nations, Matthieu was under no obligation to answer him. 

The man sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “This will go much smoother if you tell me your name. I’m Arthur Kirkland,” he added, by way of example. “The personification of England and the representative for the British Empire.”

Matthieu was silent for a moment more, gauging the man with narrowed eyes. He looked harmless enough. His sword was tucked into its scabbard and he’d taken off his tricorn hat, which incidentally also removed several inches of his perceived height and left a short, blond man with obnoxiously large eyebrows in his place. There was no hint of the cool, calculating empire François had told him about, or of the man he’d seen outside the office, strong and unyielding and uncaring for anything that didn’t pertain to him.

Then Matthieu caught a glimpse of the man’s eyes. The candlelight of the oil lamp hanging by the stairs flashed against emerald, and for the briefest second, Matthieu could see something otherworldly in Arthur’s gaze. 

His eyes were fractured, miniscule cracks in his mask that had been shattered and welded back together over many, many years. François had the same hollow gaze on nights where he lost himself staring at the fireplace and drank enough to kill a mortal man. It was the gaze of someone who’d already lived for centuries and knew they would live to see the end of forever. Those eyes had seen empires rise and fall, kingdoms that blew away like ashes on the wind in what seemed to be a single heartbeat. They’d seen everything the world had to offer and yet there was a void in the soul, a longing for something lost to dust.

And they were _tired_.

Matthieu wondered how long it would take for his eyes to begin to look like that.

He wondered if they already did.

“Matthieu,” he said after what was probably too many moments of tense silence.

The man shook his head, oblivious to the way he was being analyzed. “Matthew. I will not have you walking around as a proper English gentleman with a _French_ name.”

“Matthieu.”

“Matthew.”

Matthieu glared at him. If this man wanted him to change his name for the _third_ time in his existence, it wasn’t happening. “Matthieu.”

“ _Matthew!_ ” the man seethed and a muscle in his jaw jumped. His face had purpled slightly, but he took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Matthew is the English equivalent of _Matthieu_ ,” he pronounced it haltingly. “You will be going by that name from now on, and that is final. Am I understood?”

Matthieu scowled and retreated farther back into his hammock. He pulled the blanket over his head and blocked out the noise of the world.

_{He hoped Arthur couldn't hear him crying.}_

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


Matthieu spends the weeks at sea learning how to become _Matthew_. 

He finds that everything and yet nothing has changed.

He’s different, of course, no longer _la Nouvelle France_ but instead the colony of Canada. Just like before, this new Nation spends his every available moment in the cramped cabin below, teaching him an entirely new language. He no longer understands what the men on deck are saying, and the few that do try to include him in conversation are met with blank stares because he can only say _yes_ and _no_ and _hello, my name is Matthew_ with true certainty, and he doesn’t think they’d been impressed with that.

And yet, every now and again, he’d hear a snippet of a word he can vaguely recognize as one of French origin and he’s reminded at how interconnected the world is. The breeze off the sea and the salty spray still feel the same on his face, and the sailors sing sea-shanties with familiar melodies that cause his chest to ache, even if he doesn’t understand the words.

For the first week of the trans-Atlantic journey, Matthew stays holed up in the officer’s cabin he shares with Arthur. He even refuses to get out of his hammock for the first three of those days, only leaving when his stomach could no longer be silenced by the crashing of the waves against the hull. Arthur tries a few times to lure him out of the cabin in vain, and after the fifth day, gives up all together. They only see each other at night when Arthur returns below deck with dinner and a chalk slate, determined to drill more vocabulary and grammar rules into Matthew’s head.

Matthew listens to him speak and his eyes trace the words Arthur has written, but he never makes any move to copy them down on his own slate. He has yet to say a word to Arthur since their argument on the first day.

Eventually, Arthur gets frustrated and storms upstairs, rejoining his men around the brazier on deck.

It’s the same routine every night. 

Matthew doesn’t care. He doesn’t even bother to change his clothes before he pulls the blanket over his shoulders and closes his eyes.

He’s _miserable_ , and he’s not above making Arthur feel that way too.

Things change during his second week at sea. During that time, Matthew has changed his clothes only twice and been on deck once, and even that was only to find the Midshipman and thank him in a dejected tone for the blanket and pillow he’d given him.

Arthur finally snaps one night and throws the chalk down so hard it snaps in two upon contact with the wood floor and the halves roll out of sight in the darkness somewhere. 

“I don’t care if you’re right ticked off, you _will_ _not_ be getting any special treatment. _Up!_ ” He tugs on Matthew’s collar. “We’re going above deck.”

Matthew follows him listlessly up the stairs and out the doors, into the salty night air. The breeze sends goosebumps prickling across Matthew’s bare forearms. He shivers slightly and makes to undo the buttons that prevent his rolled up sleeves from falling when Arthur stops him with a short jerk of his head.

“Hawkins!” he barks. A gangly man starts slightly in response. “Bring the bucket over here!”

Before Matthew finished translating the words, Arthur roughly pushes a heavy wooden bucket into his arms. The pungent stench of stale salt water in the bucket nearly makes him gag.

Arthur hands him a mop and turns away, beginning to walk back to their cabin. “Wash the deck. We’ll see if a little hard work couldn’t straighten you out.”

“ _Va te faire enculer_ ,” Matthew mutters, then freezes when Arthur stops mid-step. 

“What did you just say to me?” Arthur asks, his voice quiet and cold, his back still to Matthew.

“Nothing,” Matthew says and winces as his voice cracks on the tail-end of the word. 

Arthur hums and continues his stride. “Wash the deck, then you can come back and resume the lesson.”

Matthew waits until Arthur has closed the door behind him before throwing the mop to the ground and letting out a wordless yell. A few sailors turn to look at him, but Matthew ignores them.

He screams into the night air, screams for everyone he’s lost and everyone who’d left him. He screams for the puckered scars that tug at his torso and the bloody scab around his bicep. He screams for Soaring Eagle and his mother and the unknown fates they’d met.

Most importantly, he screams for himself.

All the emotions he’d buried deep within himself since the war started come flooding out in a choked half-sob. He screams as he falls to his knees and clutches his head in his hands. He screams because _he doesn’t know who he is anymore_.

He’s no longer French but he’s not quite English, either. He’s changed his name three times in less than three-hundred years and yet none of them seem _right_ . Silent Warrior, Matthieu Bonneyfoy, Matthew Kirkland. They just don’t _fit_.

He’s not a man, but he’s certainly not a child. He’s lived through far too much to be considered a boy, and yet his body had barely grown into its early teens. Seven hundred years he’d lived in this world, and he still looked twelve. 

It made no sense and it wasn’t fair.

He tilts his head back up, letting the tears run quietly down the arch of his cheekbones, and looks at the sky.

The stars shine in a way he hasn’t seen for hundreds of years. No longer blocked out by the lights of Versailles or Québec, the night sky was infinite and eternal just like it always was in his memories. Dark blues and indigos and purples and reds swirled to be inked across the sky that was not black but somehow deeper and darker than he could describe. The stars are scattered across the sky like fairy dust and galaxies pulse in the far beyond, shimmering rose golds and silvery cobalts. He can see the constellations he’d spent hours inventing stories for and something warm settles in his chest, soothing the sharp edges that the war had brought.

The cool night breeze is crisp and salty against his skin. It whips his curls around his ears, his locks dancing with the wind. The stars shimmer in response, laughing and dancing in their own way, frozen in time and yet seeming to be everywhere.

The night sky was beautiful and endless and immortal.

And so was he. 

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


Matthew is reunited with his brother after more than a hundred years, but they’ve become strangers.

They stand in the doorway, staring at each other, yet neither moving. Arthur has one foot on the step behind Matthew and is frozen, glancing between the two of them. Matthew wonders if it had just occurred to him how similar they are.

His brother has grown. They still appear the same age, but Soaring Eagle has a good few inches on him and his shoulders are broader. The last time Matthew had seen him, they’d both had copious amounts of baby fat rounding out their features, but that was no longer the case. Soaring Eagle’s face is now all hard angles, much like their mother’s was, and his natural tan was paler, likely due to the lack of consistent sunlight in Arthur’s northern estate in York. But the cowlick in his hair remained and his eyes were the same sparkling blue Matthew remembered.

“Silent Warrior?” Soaring Eagle’s voice was breathless, as though he couldn’t imagine what he was seeing.

Matthew can’t summon the words to speak, can’t say anything of the things he’d always imagined he would, can’t believe that his brother was _there._

“Do you already know Matthew, Alfred?” Arthur asked, his brow furrowing.

“He’s my brother,” Soaring Eagle - now _Alfred_ \- didn’t take his wide eyes off Matthew. “My twin. I - I didn’t think I’d see you again.”

He spoke in the language of the Nations, which Matthew is thankful for. Eight weeks was nowhere _near_ enough time to learn a new language, even if much of it had roots in other languages Matthew already knew.

Matthew smiles shyly, the though his words still feel jumbled up in his throat. “It’s - it’s been a long time, hasn’t it?”

Somewhere, up above, the stars twinkle brighter as Gemini fades into the night sky. Castor and Pollux have returned once more.

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


“The dinner tonight is to introduce you to the rest of Arthur’s colonies. I think his brothers and sister might show up, too,” Alfred says as he leads Matthew down another staircase.

“Does he have a big family?” Matthew asks. He’d bathed for the first time in weeks and now, dressed in a clean suit, feels more composed, more prepared to face this new reality.

Alfred snorts. “I don’t know if he considers us _family_. We’re just his colonies.”

That takes Matthew aback. His brother had never been so cynical, so distrusting when he’d last seen him. The brother he remembered had looked to the world with shining eyes and a grin on his face, and now he wouldn’t meet Matthew’s gaze.

_{Matthew didn’t know that he was feeling his citizen’s upset at the Seven Years War, didn’t know that things were going to get worse when taxes were raised the following year. He didn’t know that he would have less than twelve years with his brother before everything fell apart with a single shot heard around the world.}_

“We’re here,” Alfred says, and gestures for Matthew to open a large set of double oak doors. He seems to be at a loss for what else to say.

With a deep breath and one last glance at his brother _{he still can’t believe he’s there}_ , Matthew opens the doors and steps inside.

All conversation dies when the occupants catch sight of him. Matthew can feel Alfred hovering behind him, waiting for him to enter the dining room, but Matthew feels glued to the spot. There’s dozens of eyes on him and somehow they feel like hundreds more. 

“Ah, Matthew, Alfred,” Arthur stands up from his seat at the head of the table. “We were waiting for you.”

He gestures to a set of empty seats beside a tall copper-haired man. Matthew feels like he’s hardly breathing as he approaches the table, his back ramrod straight as he slides into the empty seat nearest to the door out of the two. Alfred sits next to him and nudges him with an elbow.

“Relax,” he whispered. “It’s just dinner.”

The man next to Alfred reached for a jug on the table and poured some cider into Matthew’s glass. His auburn hair curls delicately around his ears and freckles are smattered across every inch of bare skin. He’s big and broad, in more ways than just physical. The man had an air about him, even more so than Arthur, like he’d lived a thousand lives and no longer feared the inevitability of eternity. It made Matthew feel small, though he was over seven hundred years old, and he felt every muscle in his body tremble as he curled his hand around his glass. 

“Thank you,” Matthew said softly, taking a delicate sip. “It’s good.”

“Aye,” said the man and Matthew almost dropped his glass. “It’s nice tae meet you, Matthew. Alfred’s mentioned you quite a lot.”

His accent was a thick and rolling brogue that had Matthew struggling momentarily to discpher.

“O-oh,” Mathew stuttered. “Hello. I-I don’t believe we’ve met.”

The Nation grinned, his blue eyes laughing. “I’m Alasdair Kirkland, Arthur’s older brother an’ the personification of Alba - that’s _Scotland_ in English.” There was a bitterness in his tone that Matthew filed away for later.

“I see,” Matthew said, at a loss for words. He glanced around the table at the other Nations at the table. There were several dozen of them, all eating and chatting quietly. “How did you know who I was? Even Alfred was surprised to see me.”

Alasdair chuckles, a deep, hearty laugh that seems to come from the back of his throat. “I was married tae yer father many years ago, and we still keep in touch sometimes. I was one of the first tae hear about his new colony, ken? And yer brother also wouldnae shut up about his twin, so when ye showed up, it didn’t take a genius tae figure everything out.”

Matthew just nodded in silence, taking another sip of his cider. He didn’t want to think about François less he broke down at the table. Beside him, Alfred dug into his food, oblivious to the conversation going on between the two Nations on either side of him. He cleared his throat. “Alfred said that everyone here is Arthur’s family…”

Chewing his roast in thought, Alasdair didn’t respond for a few moments and Matthew wondered if he’d said the wrong thing.

“Well, only a few of us are kin,” Alasdair said, pointing to several older Nations. They all sat near the end of the table like Alasdair was, but Arthur was the one who sat at the head. “Ye already ken our wee brother, but Owain is the second-oldest,” he gestured to a blond man who was dunking his bread in his cider, much to Arthur’s disgust. “He’s Wales. An’ the twins come after tha’. Séamus and Eireann share Ireland, which is only a client state, but Arthur asked ‘em tae come tae dinner anyhow.” He motioned toward a set of red-haired twins, a man and a woman who, despite their close proximity to each other, were tense and spoke to each other curtly.

Matthew frowned and nodded in understanding. He glanced at his plate and cut his venison half-heartedly. He missed French foods, with their rich meats in thick sauces and their flaky pastries and warm, fluffy breads. The roast before him looked good enough, but he’d always been told that the French palate was much more refined than the English. He missed _home_.

“And the rest?” he asked after another moment of hesitation.

Alasdair didn’t respond for a long moment, then, “Arthur has a lot of colonies.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please give me reviews, I thrive on validation ;)


	7. Even Stars Die

There’s a silence in the halls at night that hits him deep in his soul. He’s no longer  _ Matthieu _ but Matthew, now the British Province of Quebec, but he doesn’t feel like  _ himself _ anymore. He  _ aches _ to hear the smoothness of French curling around his tongue, but he’s no longer allowed to speak the same language as his citizens. 

There’s a gap there, Matthew realizes, that he hadn’t noticed when he lived in Versailles. It might have been because of the cultural differences warring within him now that he was a French-speaking English colony, it might have been because at that time he wasn’t yet  _ established _ as he was now and he’d returned home before he could notice it, or it could have been neither of those, but whatever the reason, it has Matthew laying awake in bed late into the night, staring at the wooden ceiling and wishing that he knew what was wrong with him.

He and Alfred are no longer what they once were. When they were children, so much younger and more innocent than they will ever be again, they were inseparable. They’d spent their days without a care in the world and there had never been any secrets between them.

Matthew had thought, had  _ hoped with every fiber of his being _ , that they could go back to being brothers again. And they were, but there was a distance between them that neither was able to fix.

_ {If Matthew ever admitted the truth to himself, that he was too  _ scared _ to fix it, to think of how different his brother had become, it was only in the darkness of his room, late at night when no one could hear his muffled sobs.} _

They had always been two halves of the same soul - Magni and Modi, Castor and Pollux, night and day - and now Matthew realizes the distance that came with being two sides of the same coin. They remained the same piece of metal, but they could never see eye-to-eye with each other. It was impossible.

And yet Matthew couldn’t hate him for that. He couldn’t hate Alfred just as the night couldn’t hate the day.  _ They were the same _ .

But they would never be alike.

Matthew was quiet, observant, content to fade into the shadows of the crowd. His smiles were rare but stunningly beautiful in the same way a lone stream in a forest is breathtaking - quiet and shy, and yet simmering with tranquil mischief. He was the moon in the night sky, seldom seen and rarely fathomed, but wondrous all the same.

Alfred smiled like the sun. He was boisterous in a charming way and  _ thrived _ on the attention given to him by Arthur, and yet his ambitions could not be satisfied. He vowed to someday be greater than Arthur ever was, his blue eyes shimmering like the open sea that provided endless opportunities. He was the sun, hated for his burning light while he was there, yet mourned for long after he left.

They were out of touch now, no longer Soaring Eagle and Silent Warrior but Alfred and Matthew Kirkland. The old empires, they’d taken two brothers and shaped them into strangers and expected that nothing would be different, that those two boys could one day inherit their legacies, be better than the Old World had ever been.

Except now Matthew was heir to no kingdom and Alfred seemed to reject the responsibilities Arthur put on him. But he was still Arthur’s favourite and Matthew was the proverbial second son, the prince with no deed to his name. He was crownless in a world built on status, a Nation suddenly gone from being a prized jewel in the New World to one of many colonies along the Atlantic coast far, far away.

Matthew rolls over and tugs the quilt up over his shoulders. He stares at the wall, refusing to let the tears fall.

_ {He wonders why he’d never realized that Magni and Modi had lost everything dear to them. He wonders why they call that a happy ending.} _


	8. And These Children That You Spit On As They Try to Change Their World

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My parents were in an accident and they have at least four broken bones between the two of them. My mom's awaiting surgery in the hospital to repair her arm, and my dad's at home with two broken elbows and strained ribs, so he can't do anything beside sit and watch TV, so I have a lot to do around the house, and I start uni in two days AND I'm working fourteen hours a week.
> 
> Basically, what I'm saying is, I have no idea when I'll be able to update next. Taking care of my dad, even with my siblings' help, is a full-time job, not counting a full semester of classes, and work. I'll try to update as soon as I can, but it might have to waiting until later November or even Christmas before I can write again.
> 
> I have a few more pre-written chapters, but after that, nothing.
> 
> I'm really sorry, but my family and my education come first.
> 
> I hope you all understand.

Arthur left sometimes, far more often than François had. It took Matthew months to get used to the suddenly silent house, how it seemed so still without Arthur’s imposing presence. 

He would be gone for weeks, months, at a time, sailing to far off lands Matthew has never seen, looking for colonies to claim or watching over the ones already established. He brought them back gifts - embroidered silk cravats and handkerchiefs, leather-bound books of both fact and fiction, exotic spices to line the shelves of the larder - as apologies for being gone for so long. He liked to spoil them, to spend time with them, but it came with a detached sort of familiarity, as though Arthur couldn’t balance his country’s relationship with the colonies and his own desire for a family with those who lived in his household. It was different, living in the manor without the empire there, but the rooms were filled with the other colonies, and the servants made sure they wanted for nothing. The older colonies, the ones that had been around for forever, weren’t always there - especially Hamish, the colony of Nova Scotia, who spent more time with Alasdair than not - but Matthew knew they were just a letter away if he needed them.

Most stayed, though, especially on nights such as this. They’d lit a fire in a ring of stones some hours before and it had slowly burnt itself out to a pile of flickering embers. The younger colonies had gone to bed but Matthew and Alfred stayed outside to watch the fire.

Connall sat up with a grunt. “I’m goin’ to bed, b’ys, and you should think about headin’ in soon, too.”

Alfred nodded in concession to Newfoundland, but they laid on the cool grass in silence until the brown-haired man left. 

It was just the two of them, alone in the twilight. The full moon was partially hidden by an overcast sky, but the stars twinkled between the gaps in the clouds. A cool breeze danced in the sweet air, carding its ethereal fingers through Matthew’s curls, urging him to join them in swaying to a song only the wind could hear. Alfred looked up at the stars, gazing longingly to a place where Polaris should have been if not for the cloud cover. His azure eyes seemed to change to a dark, deep blue, reflecting the few stars visible that night. “Do you - do you ever wonder about those no one remembers?”

Matthew followed his brother’s gaze to the sky. There was an impossible pull, a part of his very soul, that was drawn to something he couldn’t see. They hadn’t called it Polaris, then, but it was undoubtedly that which had sparked his brother’s question, much like it had so many centuries before. It was the place where they had always been told their kind went when they were no longer needed, a final resting place for the Nations history could no longer be bothered with. Most, Matthew was sure, had gone well before their time, unfairly destroyed by those who never cared about the aftermath, the ramifications of their actions. His heart ached as he thought about how many Nations must reside there now. He and Alfred were certain that their mother was gone, had only really realized it when they’d met each other again, and the pain of that realization hadn’t yet healed, had barely started to scab over. They were supposed to have died centuries ago when Skandia abandoned their colony, but instead fate dealt them another hand. They’d been allowed to live at the expense of their mother’s life. Matthew wondered how many of his siblings knew that their mother had Faded. In retrospect, the sister she’d left him with certainly had known, and he now understood her tears on the day he’d last seen his mother. Matthew wondered how many of his siblings, both Faded and not  _ {because he certainly knew that some were gone, many before he’d even gotten to know them} _ , knew what had happened to her. He wondered if she’d had a hand to hold as the light faded from her eyes, someone to sing her softly to sleep, to promise to watch over the children she’d so lovingly given her immortality for.

_ {He wondered if their siblings blamed them.} _

As though sensing the change in the air between them, Alfred sat up. His hands drifted up to his neck to fiddle with his amulet. Like Matthew’s, his amulet had begun to show signs of wear. The iron face of Modi had lost it’s sharp features, the iron smoothed down around the god’s nose and chin. There were nicks in the metal, too, remnants of the time that had passed since they’d gotten them. It had been more than seven hundred years since Skandia founded the colony of Vinland and they were born, and yet no one knew that the vikings had ever made it that far. History had forgotten them, just as it had for so many. 

“You know, the ones who are now lost to time because they never did anything worthwhile, the ones who are just footnotes in our lives?” Alfred’s voice held a bitterly wistful tone. “I mean, look at us. No one remembers that we were born centuries before they said we were simply because… we failed. The colony failed and we were abandoned by Skandia, and no one else knows where Vinland was, like we weren’t worthy enough to have anyone even  _ attempt _ to remember our colony.”

Matthew followed his brother’s lead and sat up. The dewy grass clung to his hands and sleeves as he pushed himself off the ground and he knew that they would stain, but he didn’t mind much. A few grass stains were a small price to pay for the peaceful nights they stole when Arthur wasn’t around. “I don’t know, Al. Maybe… maybe it was for the best. We’re already expected to be everything Arthur and François weren’t, to be better than they ever were, to be the beginning of a new age.” He shook his head. “I don’t know if we could ever be seen as  _ us _ if we had to live up to the legends of the vikings, too. If that happened, I think  _ we _ would become the forgotten.”

There was a heavy pause as Alfred pondered that. The cool breeze blew around the fire, breathing life back into the smoldering coals. The charred wood sparked to life once more as sparse flames licked their way up the ashy logs.

Alfred bit his lip and tore his gaze from the sky. His eyes found the spluttering campfire and he stared into it, unseeing, transfixed. He didn’t respond for a long moment, then: “I don’t want to be forgotten, I  _ can’t _ . I want to live my life, Mattie. I want to be myself, to find out what that actually means. This place,” he swept his hand around the estate. “It’s suffocating. Too much pressure, too many expectations, and yet there’s nothing in it for me. The colonies aren’t represented in the grand scheme of things. We’re always living in England’s shadow, and I’m tired of it.

Alfred drew his knees close to his chest and rested his chin on them. In the dancing light of the fire, he looked so young, so much like the thirteen-year-old he should have been if fate hadn’t cursed them with immortality. 

His face was pale as he pulled his knees impossibly closer. “I’m just - I’m just tired of it all. I want to be  _ seen _ , Mattie, I want to be  _ heard _ . I don’t want to spend my entire life bending over backwards just to be a passing mention in the history of the empire who  _ owns  _ me.”

Matthew scooted closer and put a hand on his brother’s shoulders. He had no answer for that, couldn’t make sense of his own conflicted feelings about Arthur and empires and his brother, so he squeezed Alfred’s shoulder in silent reassurance.

“I love Arthur, I really do,” Alfred whispered and hugged his knees tighter. “But I want to be remembered for being  _ me _ .”

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


Matthew found books to be his escape in the years following the Seven Years War. He devoured the volumes Arthur kept in the library and frequently slipped into his private study to nick forgotten texts from dusty shelves. He found himself enamored with the works of William Shakespeare and Henry Fielding, and returned to reread  _ Gulliver’s Travels _ and  _ Robinson Crusoe _ on several occasions, each read-through providing endless hours of entertainment and distraction from the reality he faced at the estate.

The tension in the air was stifling, so thick one could cut it with a knife if they dared to acknowledge it. It wasn’t uncommon to see the servants flit to a different room when a Nation -  _ any _ Nation - appeared, and even the colonies found other places to be when Arthur and Alfred’s furious gazes locked on each other. Matthew did his best to bridge the gap between his brother and the empire, but the issue went beyond personal vendettas.

As months turned into years and Matthew and Alfred grew faster than they ever had, Matthew found his brother slipping away from him. They’d been apart for more than a hundred years, and even the years spent together hadn’t been enough to return their bond to what it once was.

Part of it, Matthew knew, was nobody’s fault. They were growing up, growing older, leaving their endless childhoods behind as the world barrelled into a new age. After being sheltered from the world for more than six centuries, Europe had arrived in their most influential years, a time when they were still so bright-eyed and naive to think the world was inherently good. They’d been raised apart, raised by warring empires who differed greatly in the way they brought up the colonies under their care. 

Alfred had been raised as Arthur’s pride amongst the nobility of the British Empire. He’d watched as the Civil War tore Arthur apart, watched as his father-figure’s loyalties became divided between the Roundheads and Cavaliers, had watched as executions brought an end to royalty in England and Cromwell’s Parliament reigned supreme. He’d seen how rapidly things changed and then rebounded back, and had watched as the very notion of the line of succession was challenged.

He’d taken all that in and internalized it, looked to the future with starry eyes and envisioned a world led by the people. He saw how much power the masses held when they banded together toward a common goal, how much influence the sharp edge of a bayonet could give them.

Matthew, on the other hand, had been raised in the French aristocracy, the heir to one of the most powerful empires of the age. He’d been sheltered inside Versailles for most of his childhood and rarely ventured out of the palace until he was much older and aching to see the world he’d been hidden from. Even then, it hadn’t been until he’d returned to Québec that he’d truly been allowed to explore his surroundings without François hovering anxiously. That wasn’t to say that Matthew was raised any better or worse than Alfred, but simply  _ differently _ . He’d grown up in the Golden Age of Versaille, had been nurtured and allowed to  _ thrive _ under the reign of the Sun King, and France had watched with breathless wonder as what had once been a hopeless colony grew to be one of the most powerful in the New World. 

So while his brother resisted Arthur’s guidance and closed himself off from the rest of the household, Matthew hesitated. He’d seen what a powerful empire could do for a settler colony like his own and Arthur’s people were already making strides to create an understanding with the original French colonials and the Roman Catholic Church, even if Arthur had adamantly declared his own country to be Protestant. His colony was recognized as French and yet a different culture in and of itself, and it was the first thing Matthew could  _ truly _ call his own. 

In wake of that revelation, Matthew had thrown his lot in with the empire. Matthew knew it would never make him satisfied until he was his own country and he’d stop at nothing to make that dream realized, but he also recognized his youth and inexperience. He’d been in the European circles for less than two centuries and there was still much that confused him about these old empires, how the ones who were remembered lived for so long and why the forgotten ones crumbled far too easily. 

He also knew what happened when you gave into hubris. He’d studied enough historical texts and mythological tales to know that the prideful always met a lonely end.

So he would stay with Arthur and the British Empire, and watch from the sidelines as his brother forged his country in fire and blood, as teenaged ambitions were realized with a quill and ink, and a single snowball forever altered the balance of power around the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Help cheer me up with a review :) ?


	9. While They Live, Let Them Live

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have my first class in an hour and I'm like !!!
> 
> Alsooooooo
> 
> Prussia is here! 
> 
> (Oh boy...)

For once, Matthew’s ability to stand forgotten in the background was seen as a blessing, not a curse. He didn’t know if it was an ability he’d picked up in his many centuries of existence or if it was something he’d been born with, but his footsteps had always treaded lightly across even the most finicky surfaces and his aura of  _ otherness _ \- the one that came with being an immortal - had always been subdued compared to his brother’s. He had a forgettable face, which often worked against him but was not without its benefits.

When Arthur handed him a musket and a ticket to the Thirteen Colonies, Matthew didn’t ask questions. He was the logical choice; he didn’t have a distinctive accent, could speak both French and English well enough to communicate with the colonials and their allies, and he looked enough like Alfred that he could go most places unnoticed if he kept his head down and didn’t draw attention to himself.

And after Alfred’s men tried to invade him, he accepted the assignment with  _ relish _ .

_ {He still couldn’t believe his brother had invaded him.} _

Even still, he’d spent  _ months _ shivering and hungry as he warmed his frozen fingers by the meager flame of their spluttering fire. He particularly hated patrolling the Valley Forge, where the biting wind cut through his nondescript brown coat like it was made of paper. Vast as the Thirteen Colonies might have been, the Continental Army seemed to have a particular talent for choosing the  _ wrong _ places to make camp.

Matthew didn’t mind the cold, but it became increasingly hard to weather when suffering from malnutrition and the aftermath of an invasion.

_ {With a start, he realized that he’d only ever felt the cold like this once before: in Quebec, when the British had laid siege to the citadel. And even then, only the nights had been crisp and he’d had warm blankets and his father’s arms to curl into.} _

But Matthew understood loyalty, even if Alfred didn’t. Days slipped into months that slipped into years as he stayed in the shadows and passed information on to Arthur’s vast network of loyalist spies spread across the Thirteen Colonies. It was a lonely few years, ducking into the shadows when officers passed, avoiding any mention of his brother like the plague, and keeping proverbial walls erected between himself and the other recruits. It reminded him far too much of those days at sea with Arthur, when he had been too angry and upset to cooperate and Arthur had been too stubborn to try to bridge the gap between them. 

When word came that the Continental Army had signed a treaty with France, Matthew almost burst into tears. Amidst the celebrations and the toasting, he offered to patrol outside the camp, where he could be alone with his thoughts in the silence of the forest.

His  _ papa _ \- no,  _ François, _ Matthew corrected himself. He’d forfeited that privilege a long time ago - was  _ here _ . In this little stretch of land that was struggling to even keep its own troops alive.  _ This  _ was where François chose to fight. Not for Quebec, not for Acadia, not for  _ la Nouvelle France _ . François had forsaken him without so much as a goodbye and yet here he was, in the New World once again but fighting for a colony he’d never met.

Matthew sniffled, but he was no longer a child. Now coming on sixteen, it was no longer appropriate to scream and cry every time he didn’t get his way. With a sigh, Matthew loosened his grip on his musket and let himself sit heavily on the ground. A million emotions warred within him, each one trying and failing to establish a hold on his mind.

He closed his eyes and let his head fall back against a tree with the softest  _ thump _ . He felt most at ease here, surrounded by the forest. The chirping of the animals and the trills of the birds faded away in silence until only the sound of the wind rustling the trees remained. 

It was peaceful and calm and, if only for the briefest second, Matthew could pretend he was home.

Footsteps crunched the grass near him and Matthew opened one eye to observe the approaching figure.

“I thought you were supposed to be patrolling?” 

Matthew opened both eyes at the harsh Germanic accent and looked up to see a young man with shocking white hair approach him. The man wore the Prussian blues but had his jacket slung over his shoulder and his hat was nowhere to be seen. 

“Um, yes, sir,” Matthew scrambled to his feet and picked up his musket. “Sorry, sir.”

“Relax,  _ dummkopf _ ,” the man set his own musket down and sprawled out under the shade of the tree Matthew had just been sitting against. “They’re all so drunk back there that even an advanced warning wouldn’t be enough to save them.”

Matthew breathed out an awkward laugh and hesitantly sat back down again. 

They sat in an uncomfortable silence until, “ _ Gott _ , you Americans have hot weather.”

Matthew had noticed that too, but it was still preferable to the freezing cold of the winter previous. When he voiced this, the Prussian rolled over to face him. “You’ve been here long, then?”

“A few years.” He kept his answers short - clipped, even.

The Prussian hummed and threw an arm over his eyes to shield against the speckled light that broke through the leaf canopy. 

Matthew ignored him and watched a sparrow hop from branch to branch above him. It let out an almost-mechanical trill that Matthew copied, pursing his lips to return the bird’s call. Listening to the birds, he could almost pretend he was back home, back in a time before Europe ravaged his shores and killed his mother and pit him against his siblings. 

He could almost pretend it was Alfred who was sitting next to him and that any moment Matthew would hear his brother’s laughter that reminded him of safety and comfort and  _ love _ . 

_ {He could almost pretend his brother hadn’t betrayed him.} _

The Prussian lying beside him snorted. “You sound just like a - a  _ vogel _ . A birdie, I think you call it,  _ ja? _ ”

“A bird,” Matthew found his lips twitching in the barest hint of a laugh.

They lapsed into silence again, before the Prussian uncovered his eyes and stared up at Matthew. “Why did you volunteer to go patrol right when the good drinks were brought out? You could have had fun, let loose a little.”

“Don’t know,” Matthew shrugged. “Just… didn’t want to be around them, I suppose.”

The easy comradery he fell into with this man was unsettling, to say the least. He’d felt this way with very few people before and even less of them were human. It didn’t do to become friends with someone who wasn’t a Nation. Their fragile mortality always disappointed him, in the end. No matter what, they always left him.

“Well,” the Prussian sat up and withdrew a bottle of whiskey from somewhere on his person. “I don’t see why we can’t have our own fun,  _ ja _ ?”

Matthew smiled and accepted the offered bottle. Taking a long swig that burned his throat on the way down, he coughed and passed the bottle back to the other man, ignoring as the sensation made his eyes tear up. “ _ Danke _ .”

The Prussian looked startled. “You speak  _ Deutsch _ ?”

“No,” Matthew shook his head as a wry smile appeared on his face. “It’s one of the few words I know.”

“Ah, well, no problem,” the Prussian drank and then passed the bottle back to Matthew. This time, the whiskey went down easier. “I know enough English to get by.  _ Kapitän _ Gilbert Beilschmidt of the Prussian Army, at your service.”

“Private Matthew Kirkland,” Matthew shook the Prussian’s hand and they lapsed back into silence, drinking and passing the bottle back and forth. 

“Although,” Gilbert said after a long moment, passing the now half-empty bottle of whiskey to Matthew. “That’s not all you are, is it?”

Matthew paused with the bottle brushing his lips. His heart pounded so loudly beneath his uniform he wondered if the Prussian could hear it. “Pardon?”

Gilbert sat up with a grunt and rearranged his jacket into a pillow on the ground, seemingly completely oblivious to the panic Matthew was verging on. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you that Nations can recognize each other?”

In an instant, Matthew scrambled to his feet and had the barrel of his musket pointed at the Prussian. In wake of his noisy clamouring, the forest had fallen silent, as though even the wind was holding its breath. Even the sun disappeared behind a cloud cover, the temperature dropping and leaving the forest bathed in shadows.

The other Nation just took another long drag of his whiskey. His pale skin had become flushed over the afternoon as he became increasingly intoxicated. 

“Put the gun down,” Gilbert said, his eyes snapping to Matthew’s. The crimson orbs burned intensely. If François was a weary king and Arthur a land-locked sailor who longed for the sea, Gilbert was a rebellion waiting to happen. He simmered with passion and mischief and something like rage, but was not inherently angry. He was a wildcard if Matthew had ever seen one, unpredictable and alluring, fascinating for his mysteriousness, shunned for his abnormality.

“It won’t work,” he added and stretched out on his jacket. A lazy cat mildly perturbed by the disappearance of the sun it had been basking in. “You know who and what I am. The  _ Königreich Preußen _ , here to help the Americans win their revolution,” he settled and eyed Matthew with a quizzical eye. “The question is, which one are you? One of Arthur’s brats, no doubt, but who?”

Matthew could hardly stop his knees from shaking.  _ The army with a country _ .

His mouth went dry and he found himself unable to respond.

“You’re not Hamish or Connall or Dorian,” Gilbert continued as though he hadn’t noticed Matthew’s silence. “And you’re certainly not Alfred -”

“Quebec,” Matthew interrupted in a soft voice. “I’m the Province of Quebec.”

If Gilbert noticed how he gripped his gun tighter and his voice shook, he didn’t mention it.

“Alfred’s brother?” Gilbert raised an eyebrow. “And Arthur sent you to spy on your own -  _ Gott! _ ”

Matthew blinked. “You - you’re not going to turn me in?”

Gilbert shrugged. “The way I see it, no one else has noticed you’re here, and let’s be real, you’re not doing much anyway -”

Matthew bristed.

“- And I’m interested in how this will play out. Your face is too pretty to have the Americans mess up.”

He winked at Matthew, who just blinked in confusion. Hesitantly, Matthew sat back down though he was tense, poised to flee the second the other Nation turned against him.

“Relax, Birdie,” Gilbert sighed and patted the grass next to him. “ _ Ich bin fix und fertig _ . If I wanted to kill you, I would have by now. Let’s just… sit for a while.”

He held out the bottle of whiskey, the remaining quarter swishing within.

“What the hell,” Matthew took the bottle from Gilbert and tipped his head back, letting the burning alcohol pour down his throat until there were only a few mouthfuls left when he passed it back.

Gilbert looked at the bottle in his hand and grinned. “I think I’m starting to like you, Birdie.” 


	10. The Bitter Triumph of Falling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I meant to update yesterday, but I've been swamped (already) with uni homework and it was my sister's thirteen birthday.

Sweat dripped down Matthew’s neck, the humidity suffocating. In the distance, storm clouds as black as night gathered and threatened to open up above them at any given moment. The tree Matthew stood beneath offered little protection from the heat, and the dust of the barren field rose up with each swell of the wind, getting in his eyes and soiling his crimson uniform. 

Between the sweat and the dust and the gunpowder stains, Matthew didn’t know if there was even a scrap of fabric in his uniform that could be saved. His boots, once shined and polished regularity, were now scuffed and filthy, the leather wearing down around the toes and Matthew was almost certain the grove in the right one was from a stray bullet that somehow missed him. 

Alasdair stood several feet to his left under the shade of the same tree. He was leaning on his musket, letting his good leg take the weight off his bandaged knee, the perfect picture of nonchalance if not for the frown that marred his face. His thick red curls were plastered to his face with sweat and his eyes were dull with exhaustion. But he watched his little brother attentively from across the field, waiting, as they all did, with bated breath to see how it would unfold. 

For Arthur and Alfred were at a standstill. Their armies stood behind their respective Nations, both confused as to why they were there and yet determined to see the war to an end, one way or another.

Matthew stood with his back to the town they’d defended for three weeks. Three god-awful weeks of rationing their limited supplies and watching in growing horror as the lights from the campfires grew brighter with each cohort of reinforcements brought to aid the Americans. It had been three weeks of watching as the days grew shorter and the nights became crisper and dreading his turn on patrol because  _ what if he had to shoot Alfred? _ With every pop of gunfire, Matthew wondered if his brother was out there, returning fire against the man who might have been the closest thing he had to a father, and him, the elder twin who’d promised to always be there for Alfred, to always protect him.

And now he was shooting at his brother’s men.

But it didn’t look as though Alfred needed his help, or even had missed him. Gilbert and François stood several paces behind the rear guard with a small gathering of their own countrymen. He’d had support from two of the most powerful empires of the time, had pitted them against their rival across the seas.

Pitted François against  _ him _ .

Matthew wondered if François even knew he was there. Gilbert surely did, but Matthew had no idea how much of their meeting the Prussian had shared with the Americans and their allies. If François saw him, what would he do? Would he swoop down on Arthur in a rage for taking Matthew to war, or would he take his ire out on Matthew himself, for not siding with Alfred when he had the chance? Or would he look at Matthew with indifferent eyes, uncaring now that Matthew wasn’t his problem to deal with?

Matthew didn’t know which option was kinder.

Arthur charged Alfred and Matthew found himself unconsciously stepping forward a half-step before pausing. He had no obligation to Alfred beyond what family deserved, and Alfred had made it clear he didn’t consider them family any longer.

The sky blackened as Alfred yelled something to Arthur that was lost in the wind, and the leaves of the tree shook with the gusts of the impending storm. Out of the corner of his eye, Matthew saw Alasdair push himself off his musket and approach the front lines and Matthew followed, eyes determinedly glued to the redcoat in front of him. He didn’t want to risk his gazing slipping and connecting with François.

“You’re a real bastard, you know that?” Arthur growled. For all the shouting, his musket still rested on his shoulder in parade position. “I had to sail across an entire ocean to deal with your temper tantrum, and it’s been a bloody big one, too.”

Alfred’s face screwed up in a scowl. He held his gun loosely, the point of the barrel dipping to point at Arthur’s lower belly. “It’s not a temper tantrum! You had your time and you  _ failed _ . I’m independent now, old man, so  _ deal with it! _ ”

Matthew felt more than saw Arthur’s anger rise. It sent a shock wave rippling through his troops, and the redcoats shifted on their feet, unaware of the supernatural force that had caused a surge of pain and rage to wash over them, but feeling the effects all the same.

With lighting fast, practiced ease, Arthur snapped the hammer stall off and pulled the hammer to full cock and pointed the musket at Alfred. Directly between the eyes - a kill shot that Matthew knew would keep their even their kind down for a few days.

The air was charged, tensed, as the Continental Army levelled their weapons and the British did the same. Thunder rumbled in the distance and the skies that had been threatening to open all day let out a few drops.

“Dammit,” Arthur’s voice cracked and he squeezed his eyes shut. The rain began to pour down in earnest. “I can’t shoot you. Fucking naive boy.”

The musket fell out of Arthur’s hands as his arms lowered to rest limply by his side. He seemed  _ defeated _ , in a way Matthew had never seen before, not even when he and his siblings exchanged scathing words and refrained from speaking to each other for months on end.

“I’m not naive!” Alfred's voice jumped an octave and he cleared his throat. “I’ve been through more than you will  _ ever _ know and I’m more than ready to be my own country.  _ You’re _ the naive one if you can’t see that being with you is  _ suffocating _ , that you’re selfish and greedy and looking to blame everyone but yourself! You’re a shallow old empire who’s outlived his usefulness and I’m  _ glad _ to be rid of you!.”

Arthur didn’t cry. He didn’t pick up his musket. He didn’t yell. He didn’t do anything. 

Arthur’s face had gone completely blank, his eyes dull and unseeing as Alfred spat vicious insults that found their intended targets deep within him. Matthew could only watch as Arthur’s knees gave out and he crumpled to the wet earth beneath him.

There was no emotion but fury on Alfred’s face. “I’ll take that as the surrender it is.”

The Continental Army surged forward to take the redcoats prisoner. Matthew couldn’t do anything, helpless as he and Alasdair were pushed roughly to their knees next to Arthur’s prone form. The rain plastered his bangs to his forehead, but Matthew could hardly feel its freezing embrace. 

They’d surrendered. They’d lost.

Alfred wasn’t going home with them.

Long white legs appeared in Matthew’s vision and he looked up from the ground to see a man on horseback slow to a stop beside Alfred. The man’s stern face was hidden partially by the black tricorn he wore but the stars on his epaulettes marked him as a general.

Matthew had never met General Washington. Though he had camped with the man’s army, he’d always stayed clear of the man and his wife and  _ aides-de-camp _ , fearing that they, of all people, would be the ones most likely to notice his uncanny similarity to Alfred. He knew, however, that Alfred held him in high esteem and had the meeting been under different circumstances, Matthew might have struck up a conversation to see what about this mortal had Alfred so enraptured.

Washington stared the three nations down, his frown deepening. His eyes drifted to Arthur and they didn’t leave even as he said, “Alfred, what do you want to do with them?”

Alfred hesitated, as though he hadn’t thought that far, hadn’t imagined that he’d ever have to see Arthur in such a state, nor his brother and proverbial uncle kneeling in the mud, both of them glaring daggers at him.

“I leave this decision to you,” Washington added, his voice low and firm, “As I know wars play out differently for your kind, but if you cannot come up with a suitable solution, I will have them taken into custody.”

Alfred’s face was still scrunched up in a scowl. For s moment - one long,  _ godawful _ moment - Matthew thought he was going to have them executed. He did not fear death, he knew he would be revived hours or days or weeks later, perfectly healthy, but he  _ did  _ fear the thought of it being  _ Alfred _ that killed him - that orchestrated his first death. Then something in Alfred’s eyes shifted, but for better or for worse, Matthew couldn’t tell. He said, “Let them go. They can’t negotiate any peace treaties in a cell.”

Washington clenched his jaw but nodded to the men holding Matthew and Alasdair’s arms behind their backs and they were released, but Matthew noticed the soldiers didn’t move from their position guarding them.

Matthew stood, his knees smarting from being forced into one position for so long. His clothes were absolutely soaked through and they were swollen and restricting, hard to move in. The damp chill seemed to have seeped into his bones. The tips of his ears were numb.

But Alfred took no notice of that. He turned his anger on Matthew, practically  _ seething _ as he stared his older brother down.

“I’m your brother,” Alfred said at last. “Does that mean nothing to you?”

Fury welled up in Matthew’s chest. How  _ dare _ Alfred talk about brotherhood and family when  _ he _ was the one who left, the one who declared war, the one who  _ invaded _ him.

“I’m a loyal son,” Matthew spat, “And I stand with Arthur.”

Alfred’s eyes hardened and he reached into his uniform. For a moment, Matthew thought he was going to pull a pistol out from beneath his shirt and shoot him, but what he did was far worse. 

Out of the collar of his shirt, Alfred pulled his amulet into the rain. The iron was as sparkling and polished as ever and the leather cord it hung on was long enough that it would have rested right over his heart.

“You’re all wrong,” Alfred said and gripped the amulet tighter. “I’ll do it, I’ll be better than Arthur ever was, and someday you’ll regret not joining me.”

“You  _ betrayed _ me,” Matthew could feel his eyes burning and hoped the tears were from fury. It hurt too much to think of the alternative. “Did the past seven hundred years mean  _ nothing _ to you?”

Alfred said nothing. With a quick jerk of his hand, he broke the leather tie of his amulet.

The snap of the cord echoed the one in Matthew’s heart.

“There’s a reason our kind don’t have families,” Alfred said and rubbed his thumb over Modi’s iron face. He looked down at the iron in his hand with something like wistfulness, but it was overshadowed by the anger in his voice. “Seven hundred years is a long time.”

He let the amulet fall from his hand. It hit the ground at Matthew’s feet and Alfred made no move to pick it up.

As he watched Alfred turn and leave, Matthew understood what his final gesture was. 

His brother had forsaken him. For choosing the empire, Matthew had lost the last member of his family. 

He’d lost Skandia a long time ago, and his mother and his siblings when he’d embraced the Europeans. François had been the one to leave him, but Matthew still feared that it was somehow  _ his fault. _

And now Alfred was gone. He’d lost his brother for more than a hundred and fifty years and barely had thirteen with him before Alfred decided that familial relations meant nothing to him. 

In a daze, Matthew bent down and picked up the amulet. He barely registered Alasdair's words of “It’s a lang road that’s no got a turnin’, wee brother. Let’s get ye tae the ship,” as he picked Arthur up from the mud, and he hardly noticed the redcoats parting around them as they were led away by the Americans. 

The iron was still warm in his palm, his brother’s touch lingering on the amulet. Matthew looked up, looking for  _ what _ , he didn’t know as Alfred had made his stance on their relationship abundantly clear. 

But he was met with the faces of Gilbert and François, still standing at the back of the army with their men. Matthew stared them down, his violet eyes burning intensely. 

François looked away first, his sodden ponytail sticking limply to his neck and his musket resting on his shoulder. He wouldn’t meet Matthew’s eyes even as he turned to translate the surrender to his men.

But Gilbert held Matthew’s gaze, his crimson eyes boring into Matthew’s violet. There was an unreadable expression on his face and Matthew couldn’t tell if he was thinking about him or Arthur or the surrender in general. Then the Prussian winked at him and Matthew looked away, his own emotions too much of a maelstrom within him to even begin to untangle the meaning behind Gilbert’s gesture.

Wrapping the broken ends of the leather cord around his wrist, Matthew caught up with Alasdair on the path down to the beach, where their small naval fleet waited. Arthur was unmoving in his brother’s arms, his eyes staring resolutely at nothing. It made Matthew uneasy. He knew how to deal with anger and with tears but not with whatever silence had ahold of Arthur.

The idea that his brother could cause someone so much pain they just… shut down, was unnerving, to say the least.

Matthew didn’t know what he was supposed to feel. Rage, at his brother’s parting words? Sorrow for the loss of Alfred’s presence around the estate? Was he supposed to feel excited at the prospect of filling the gap Alfred had left?

But all he could feel was a pain in his chest, an ache so deep in spread throughout his body and sunk into his bones. A weariness settled on his shoulders as he watched Alasdair limp forward with his injured leg, carrying the weight of his youngest brother in his arms. The brother Matthew wasn’t sure would ever recover from Alfred’s betrayal.

And as he watched the rain slip down Modi’s iron face, Matthew could almost pretend the god was crying.


	11. Burdened With the Blame of Living in the Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I meant to post this sooner. Uni is crazy and when I did have the time to update, the last thing I wanted to do was stare into the computer screen, even if it was only for the handful of minutes it took to post a chapter.

Years passed. Springs fell into summers that melted into falls that bled into winter far too quickly. The snow that dusted across the frozen grass melted under the mild English winter, replaced far too often by icy sleet that left everything feeling soggy and bleak. Although when he was younger, Matthew had often waited for the coldest days to bundle up and run outside in the sleet, hoping to feel the wet imitation of snow against his skin, he no longer had the desire to play in the winter rain. Instead, the damp days seemed to weigh heavily on his bones and without anyone to cavort with under the overcast sky, winter just seemed to lose its magic, even when it did snow. Matthew tried to reassure himself that he was getting too old to do so, anyway. He was sixteen and almost eight hundred - far too old to throw soggy snowballs at his friends. There were more important things to do around the estate, anyway, things better suited to a young gentleman such as himself. 

Rain splattered against the window and the day outside was grey and dreary, but inside the parlour, Matthew sat warm and content, curled up on a plush settee in front of a roaring fire. A woollen blanket was draped around his shoulders and a steaming cup of tea sat on a porcelain saucer on the table beside him, left largely ignored as Matthew’s attention became increasingly drawn to the book in his lap. 

_ The Vicar of Wakefield _ was a wonderful novel, full of scandal and bankruptcy and forbidden love, and Matthew was enjoying it immensely, though he felt that  _ The Life, Adventures, and Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton _ was more to his tastes. Still, he’d promised Genevieve he’d read it, if only so she would leave him alone. 

_ {No matter what, he wasn’t going to give her the satisfaction of knowing that he actually couldn’t put it down.} _

The personification of St. John’s Island sat on a chair of her own by the fire, her legs crossed and her cross-stitch balanced on her knee. The two of them sat in silence, but they were far from strangers. They’d both been raised by François, albeit apart and with minimal interactions and she’d been taken into Arthur’s household a handful of years before Matthew had, but Matthew had clung to her like a lifeline when he’d arrived, her and Alfred being among the few he recognized and trusted. 

“Matthew?”

Both Matthew and Genevieve paused what they were doing and turned to the door the warbling voice had come from.

A mop of brown hair peeked around the doorframe, the boy it was attached to hiding in the hallway. 

Matthew rose from his seat and tucked an embroidered bookmark between the pages of his book to save his place. The blanket slipped from his shoulders and he wistfully mourned its soft embrace as he left the reach of the fire’s warmth. 

His feet padded across the wooden floor clad only in thick woollen socks, his shoes left by the settee. He slipped out of the parlour and rounded around the side of the doorframe to where the colony waited out of sight.

Although Arthur had taken in several new colonies recently, Matthew recognized this boy immediately. He’d come with his brother a few years before, two personifications of New South Wales, and had moved into Alfred’s old room.

“Is something the matter, Dylan?” 

The boy’s green eyes snapped to his and then dropped to his feet. His koala-spirit rested on his shoulder, given to him by Arthur, just like he’d given Matthew his bear, when he’d become a British colony. Standing no taller than a five-year-old, he was dwarfed by Matthew’s height, so he crouched to put himself at Dylan’s eye-level. 

“Is it Tobias?”

The boy shook his head. “It’s Arthur,” he said and sniffed. Matthew hoped he wasn’t coming down with a cold. “He’s locked himself in his office again.”

“Ah,” Matthew scratched his nose. “Have you told Owain or Alasdair?”

“Couldn’t find them,” Dylan mumbled.

“Okay, well, you did well by coming to find me,” Matthew said and rose from his crouch. “How long has he been in there?”

Dylan fidgeted, his koala clinging to his neck. “A few days, I think. ‘M not sure.”

Matthew thought about it. It was Thursday and he hadn’t seen Arthur since dinner on Sunday, which meant he could have been in his office the entire time. “I bet he hasn’t eaten in a while, either,” Matthew said to the boy before him, “How about we go see if we can liberate some scones from Cook?”

Dylan bit his lip, but the beginnings of a smile were starting to tug at his mouth, and Matthew bent down to let him climb on his back. “Do you think we can get cakes, too?”

Matthew smiled and began walking toward the servant’s entrance to the kitchen, far removed from the grand doors that opened to the dining room. “I don’t see why not. What Cook doesn’t know can’t hurt her.”

The colony’s tinkling laugh echoed in Matthew’s ears and Matthew shushed him with a giggle of his own as they reached the small wooden door, cracked openly slightly, the smell of dinner wafting into the hallway. 

Carefully, Matthew pushed the door open, checked to make sure none of the servants were looking at him, slid Dylan off his back, then motioned for him to follow. His green eyes were sparkling with excitement as they crept around the kitchen, hiding behind the counters and slowly but surely approaching the tiered stands that held the pastries. None of the apron-clad humans bustling about over the stewing dinner gave any indication they knew he and Dylan were there.

With his hand pushed against Dylan’s mouth to stifle his giggles, Matthew quickly pulled the platter of macaroons closer to the edge and let the boy grab as many as he could and stuff them in his vest. He did the same with the platter of shortbread and then the raspberry tarts. 

_ {Matthew winced at the time the maids were going to have getting the stains out.} _

“ _ Oi! _ You, there! Get your ‘ands off my cakes!”

With a clatter of pots and pans, Cook was storming toward them, her wooden spoon like a paddle in her hands. 

They’d been caught.

“Go, Dylan!” Matthew yelled, but he was laughing. He pushed the boy to his feet. “Run! Leave me behind, I’ll be alright!”

Dylan scrambled out of the kitchen, dropping crumbs as he went. He nearly crashed into a serving boy carrying a steaming pot before disappearing out the door to wherever he went to squirrel his treats away.

“Master Matthew, I should ‘ave known it be you boys,” Cook snarled, stopping right at Matthew’s feet. Matthew had a good few inches on her, but her red face and drawn brows always made her appear far more dangerous than her short stature suggested. “Always sneakin’ my food before I puts it on the table.”

She rapped her spoon on the back of Matthew’s hand and he winced, clutching his hand close to himself. “Sorry, Cook,” he said. “We actually came to get tea and scones for Arthur.”

“An’ steal my cakes while you’re at it,” she huffed.

He smiled sheepishly.

“Good luck tryin’ to get ‘is Lordship to eat,” she added and turned to rearrange the sweets on their platter. “All the plates we’ve left out for ‘im ‘ave returned to us without a morsel touched.

She sniffed, as though personally offended. Which, Matthew amended, was fair. She was the best out of all the cooks Arthur had employed before, and refusing her food was nothing short of a scandal.

“I know,” Matthew said, “But I was hoping to try anyway.”

He put on a winning smile, relieved when she rolled her eyes and barked at a kitchen maid to set a kettle of water to boil. When she turned her back to grab the platter of cranberry scones, Matthew stuffed a shortbread in his mouth.

Her head whipped back but he just gave her a tight-lipped smile, hoping there weren't any crumbs on his face.

She narrowed her eyes but returned to the scones. 

Matthew snatched another biscuit. 

Cook turned with a huff and all but shoved the plate of buttered scones into his hands. “Your tea is over there, Master Matthew.  _ Please _ get out of my kitchen.”

Thanking her, Matthew swept past her only to grab a tart and dash over to where a bemused kitchen maid was waiting with a steaming cup of black tea.

_ {She must have been new.} _

Ignoring Cook’s angry squawk of “Get your rudding ‘ands off ma cakes!”, Matthew slipped out of the kitchen, balancing Arthur’s plate in one hand and the teacup in the other, with his raspberry tart between his teeth.

It was utterly un-gentlemanly and Arthur would have had a fit if he saw Matthew’s state: dashing about the estate with no shoes on, crumbs covering his jacket, and a tart clenched between his teeth. 

But Arthur hadn’t been out of his office in days and Matthew doubted he would be in any state to comment on Matthew’s own disheveledness. If it was like any of the other times Matthew had needed to drag him from his work, Arthur would be delirious and near-collapse, and once he was conscious, he’d have to deal with Alasdair or Owain chewing him out for being irresponsible. 

_ {As much as they pretended to hate him, Matthew knew they cared for Arthur in their own ways.} _

Reaching Arthur’s wing, Matthew turned to the first door in the hall and shuffled the teacup to his other hand. With a porcelain plate and teacup balancing precariously in one hand, Matthew finally stuffed the rest of his tart in his mouth and paused, chewing a moment. Swallowing and brushing his mouth with the back of his free hand to make sure no crumbs rested on his face, Matthew rapped the door and took a step back.

There was no noise from inside, no shuffling of papers, no chair grinding against the wooden floor. Nothing to indicate the office was even occupied.

And then Arthur’s voice rang from the other side of the door. “Enter.”

Matthew twisted the knob and pushed the door open, transferring the teacup back to his other hand as he walked in.

The fire burned low in the hearth, as though no servants had been in to rouse the coals back to life, and the curtains were drawn across the windows, letting no light from the gloomy day inside. Arthur sat at his desk opposite the door, paying no mind to Matthew. Piles of papers were scattered across the desk’s surface and the inkpot was placed dangerously close to the edge, enough so that one wrong slip of Arthur’s hand would send it shattering to the ground. In the corner of the room, Arthur’s large armchair sat unused, his latest embroidery project forgotten on the table beside it. Even the cup of tea placed next to the hoop was cold and stagnant. Untouched.

“I brought you something,” Matthew said carefully, not wanting to startle Arthur when he was obviously so deep in thought. “Cook says you haven’t been eating.”

“Yes, yes,” Arthur waved his hand dismissively, but he moved a stack of papers so Matthew could set the tea and scones on the desk. “I’ve been very busy lately.”

“Too busy to take care of yourself?” Matthew asked, though he feared he knew the answer. 

Arthur grumbled something under his breath, but he set the quill down and reached for the teacup, his eyes not leaving the paper he was reading. Matthew would have to count that as a win, for now. 

He sipped the tea and winced at the scalding temperature, flipping the page. “You know I have much to do. But thank you for the tea, Alfred-”

All the air left Matthew’s lungs. 

His green eyes snapped up to meet Matthew’s purple.

Arthur’s nostrils flared and his eyes took on a watery quality, “Get out.”

“Arthur -”

“ _ Get out! _ ”

Matthew scurried to the door and slammed it shut just as a teacup shattered against the wall next to him. 

Matthew  _ ran _ . He ran through the halls of the mansion, picking up speed, leaving behind Arthur’s sobs that seemed to echo in his ears. The wood and plaster blurred together with the faces of startled servants as he passed, his sock feet pounding against the floor.

_ He was such a fucking idiot _ .

He burst through the parlour, ignoring the cries of those occupying it, and kept running. He kept running until he reached another set of doors and he threw those open too, practically launching himself outside. 

He stumbled as his stockings sank in the wet earth of the moors that bordered Arthur’s estate but he quickly regained his footing. Heart pumping, feet pounding, Matthew ran through the cool mists, not feeling the freezing droplets of rain that ran down his face and jacket.

_ He was so fucking  _ stupid _. Such an idiot. _

He hardly noticed when he’d crested the hill behind the estate and came to a stop at the border of the ancient Kingswood. The trees loomed far above him, their frames skeletal and rustling with the battering winter winds. 

Atop the hill, the winds seemed to pick up speed, crashing against the trees and blowing past Matthew with such intensity it felt as though he was wearing nothing but his underclothes. His jacket had become sodden and heavy, and his fingers burned with the cold. Unable to support himself any longer, his trembling legs gave out and he sat down heavily on the root of a large cedar. 

Matthew let his head fall back against the trunk and let out a long sigh.

He couldn’t blame Arthur. It wasn’t his fault; they’d all thought he was getting better. The days where he became distant or lashed out at them had become less and less, and as the months that separated them from the Revolution had increased, he’d been healing. There were fewer days where he didn’t come out of his office and fewer nights where he was found with a near-empty bottle of rum in hand, staring blankly at the fire in the hearth. He’d begun to join them for dinners again, and to those who’d never seen him before Alfred had left, he seemed to be back to normal.

_ {Maybe, Matthew admitted, he ignored the signs because he, too, wanted Arthur back.} _

It had still taken Arthur years to be able to look Matthew in the face without seeing Alfred in his place. 

But there were days when it seemed like everything had been for nought. Days, still, when he didn’t eat or when he drowned his sorrows in tumbler after tumbler of rum. Days when that fire that Matthew had seen on the ship so many years ago disappeared behind a blank expression and he saw the weight of the centuries reflected in Arthur’s eyes. 

François had been the same, so many years ago. He’d found Matthew when he was just a child, still so innocent and unmarred by war and death, still a vast unknown in a charted world, where possibilities were endless and Matthew’s love for him was just the same. He’d nurtured Matthew, allowed him to grow alongside the French Empire and be educated in the courts of kings. Matthew had been his pride and joy, and for the first time, Matthew had had a father in his life - not Skandia, the man who left him, but François, who  _ chose _ him, who  _ stayed _ .

But Matthew had fooled himself into thinking that their bond was eternal. Somewhere between running the ramparts of Quebec and sneaking into meetings in Versaille, Matthew had forgotten how long eternity  _ was _ . Their kind could live forever, if fate allowed it, and death did not mark an easy end for them. There was no quick way out, no way to escape the sins of your past and the bitter hope for the future. They would watch mortals waste away chasing after immortality and longed to scream,  _ it’s not worth it _ . 

Because seven hundred years was a long time, even for Nations. François had gotten bored of him after barely a hundred and fifty, had dumped him on another empire the moment he became a burden to deal with. And Matthew should have seen that coming; he’d grown up around his siblings, of course, who fought with each other just as often as they were allies. He should have known, should have seen the evidence in front of his eyes, that just because someone claimed you as family did not mean they meant it. Just like the changing of tides, Nations switched loyalties like it was an inherent part of their being. 

And it was. As much as Matthew Kirkland had free will, he was also the Province of Quebec, and that demanded certain allegiances, certain bonds that must be broken for the sake of the empire and the colony he was bound to.

There were sacrifices that had to be made for the sake of his colony, even if they broke Matthew’s heart in the process. 

Really, François and Alfred had made it easy. They’d both been the ones to denounce their friendship, their kinship, and ally against him behind his back. François had been the one to give him up first, and even if that still hurt Matthew decades later, he refused to give the man the satisfaction of knowing how much he’d meant to Matthew, how betrayed he’d felt when François had the option to take him back and  _ didn’t _ . 

And Alfred was his baby brother. They had been one colony together, spent seven hundred years roaming the wilderness with their mother, running through fields of wildflowers and splashing in swift streams, and they should have known it wasn’t going to last forever.  _ Matthew _ should have known. He should have known that loyalties didn’t last forever with their kind, even between brothers.  _ That _ should have been obvious from the very moment he’d sense Alasdair’s silent fury toward Arthur.

But he’d foolishly believed that they were different, that no matter what, the New World would be  _ better _ than the Old ever was, that they wouldn’t make the same mistakes. But they had, and Matthew had chosen the empire over his brother, chosen Arthur over Alfred, and now his brother was gone, tucked away in his fledgeling nation far across the sea and Matthew was the one who had to deal with the fallout. 

He wished he could march down to the Thirteen Colonies - no,  _ the United States of America _ \- and grab Alfred by the shoulders and shake some sense into him. Remind him of the dangers of hubris and growing too big, too quickly. Remind him of Skandia and their mother and how both of them, two powerful Ancients, were gone, far too soon, far too fast. Remind him that  _ they _ were Magni and Modi, Strength and Bravery, and they were the ones meant to inherit the new world, to wield the relics of kings and gods, but they couldn’t do that with this rift between them - a rift  _ Alfred _ had caused.

Matthew’s toes squelched in the mud, freezing water seeping into his stockings and pouring over his numb toes. He would catch his death out here, he knew, even though he really couldn’t die. Perhaps he’d catch chincough or consumption and slip blissfully into nothingness for a few days as his body recovered. The rain, at least, had let up into a light drizzle, though the clouds still obscured far too much of the sky for Matthew to judge with any real accuracy how long he’d been sitting beneath the ancient cedar.

There was still no snow. Matthew  _ missed _ snow.

He missed home.

_ {He didn't know what home was, anymore.} _

Footsteps squished up the hill, accompanied by muttering that was lost to the wind. Matthew looked up to find Genevieve picking her way up the hillside, carefully avoiding loose roots hidden by the decomposing layer of dead vegetation and the mud puddles that pooled over their rims and ran down the slope. She held her skirts up in one hand, dutifully making sure the hem didn’t train in the mud, but wet leaves clung to the muck that splattered on her polished leather boots.

“Honestly, Matthew,” she tsked, hopping over a running stream of brown water, “You could have bothered to at least put on a coat.”

Her own shawl didn’t seem to be doing much against the freezing rain.

“I want to be left alone,” Matthew said, pulling his knees to his chest and looking away from her.

“ _ Non, Matthieu _ ,” she said and his head snapped up, “You  _ will  _ come inside before we have to call on a doctor.”

“Please?” Matthew begged. He couldn’t stomach entering the mansion yet, not until the damp English winter froze him solid. Only the numb, shooting pains in his icy fingers and swollen toes grounded him, broke through the whirlwind of thoughts in his mind. He had no desire to leave this spot until the last dregs of guilt and shame were swept from him by the bitter winds that blew off the moors.

She tilted her head sternly and sniffed. “Come, Matthew.”

With a sigh, Matthew uncurled himself and stood up. The wind, eager at the new flesh and soaking clothes available, wasted no time in trying to blow him off the hill. His shirt was plastered to his chest and his curls were frozen around his ears. He tucked his hands under his armpits, trying in vain to warm his frozen fingers.

She grabbed his elbow and led him down the hill, using his weight as a brace against the slippery slope. Together they hurried across Arthur’s immense grounds in silence, hunched over against the wind. Genevieve's cheeks and nose had become rosy in the cold and Matthew was sure he was just the same, or worse. 

When they stepped through the doors, the warmth of the parlour fire washed over him like a hot bath. As the warm air clashed with the cold, Matthew felt his exposed skin begin tingling and he quickly turned around to shut the doors.

Genevive placed the back of her hand against Matthew’s forehead. Her face scrunched up, full of concern. “You’re still far too cold, Matthew. Maybe you should go sit by the fire.”

The way she phrased it made it clear that it was not a suggestion.

She dragged him over to the fire and pulled his jacket off, hanging it on the mantle to dry with her shawl. He sat on a pile of pillows in front of the hearth - undoubtedly placed there by Dylan or Tobias when they were building a fort earlier - and watched as she stoked the fire and pulled a worn, leather-bound book from the bookshelf.

The flames snapped, shooting crackling sparks up the chimney. 

“Lie down,” she said, sitting down and reclining her head against a pillow propped up by several others. She opened the book and began, “ _ Manfred, Prince of Otranto, had one son and one daughter… _ ”

As he drifted off to the quiet lull of her voice, Matthew was resoundingly determined to not tell her he liked this one, too. No one had to know he had the same taste in books as Genevieve.

_ {And if he woke up later that night with Arthur laying a blanket over the two of them, eyes soft and apologetic, not making any fuss over their filthy clothes on his beautiful rug, well, no one had to know that either.} _


	12. More Distant and Solemn than a Fading Star

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last of the prewritten chapters. Sorry guys, but I have no idea when I'll be able to update next. I have tons of ideas swirling around in my brain, it's just finding the time and motivation to sit down at my computer for four hours and write it into existence. 
> 
> But, its a long chapter to make up for it, so there you go!
> 
> Everyone, please stay safe!

“Ah, Griffiths, right on time with the post, as usual,” Arthur dabbed at his mouth with his serviette and held out a hand for the pile of letters the butler presented him with.

“They consist mainly of correspondence from His Majesty, my lord,” Griffiths, their ageing butler, said, bowing and handing the envelopes to Arthur. His salt and pepper hair was unpowdered and pulled back in a tight tail at the nape of his neck.“There is also an answer to your earlier query from Prime Minister Pitt, and a letter from Master Séamus addressed to  _ A Fecking Caffler _ . I took the liberty of burning it for you.” 

“Thank you, Griffiths,” Arthur said, already rising from his seat with the intent on retreating to his office, leaving his breakfast half-eaten. His eyes locked on the letter Griffiths still held. “And that one?”

Griffiths’ grip on the letter tightened. “Forgive me, my lord, but this was addressed to Master Matthew.”

The sudden silence at the table was deafening. All conversations halted and forks hovered where the hands holding them froze. No one, not any of the colonies, got letters. Any messages from their territories that needed immediate and experienced wisdom went to Arthur; the rest were sent through the Parliament. Every one of them had cut ties with their previous empires - if they’d had one - and their only interactions with Nations were with each other. Even Hamish, who’d grown up with Alasdair and frequented between his house and Arthur’s, never wrote to any one of them specifically. If he ever had anything that needed to be known so urgently as to pay for a letter, he always addressed it to all of them, never one, and he’d often forwent that in favour of filling them in the next time he saw them.

So it made no sense as to why Matthew was receiving a letter so important that Griffiths refused to let Arthur see the handwriting on the envelope. Was it François, finally so drunk on imperialism that he made the  _ awful _ decision of writing to Matthew for the first time in forty years? Surely having your head chopped off by a guillotine for serving one regime only to be revived into being the puppet of another wouldn’t be enough to make the Nation  _ completely _ lose his common sense? They were at  _ war _ ,  _ sacrament! _ Did François really believe him to be so foolish as to accept his gesture with open arms? He’d been  _ abandoned _ without a goodbye, for fuck’s sake, and no amount of grovelling would make him forgive or forget.

Matthew set his fork down and stood, reaching for the letter. Griffiths handed it to him, but not without a stern look of disapproval and… pity?

Mystified, Matthew broke the unfamiliar wax seal on the envelope - an eagle perched on the branch of an oak tree. It definitely wasn’t François, then, because that was not what his signet ring was engraved with. It wasn’t Hamish either, nor Alasdair, Owain, Séamus or Éireann. Connall and Dorian were both seated at the table, so it couldn’t be them, and he hadn’t heard a word from Gilbert since he’d seen him last in Yorktown.

He slid the paper out and unfolded it. The black ink glistened in the light of the crystal chandelier, making it shine with a blue hue. The date at the top put the letter’s creation at nearly two months before. 

His eyes scanned down the paper and his hand began to shake.

_ Dear Mattie, _

_ I know we ended things on an unfortunate note, but as your brother, I would like to _

That was as far as Matthew got before rage welled up in his chest and the letter crumpled in his grip. He hadn’t felt this kind of fury since the revolution had ended. Like Arthur, he’d been healing and putting the past behind him, and even the days when the sight of Dylan in Alfred’s bedroom sent him spiralling into  _ what-ifs  _ and  _ what could have beens _ had become less and less common as other things took precedence in his mind - namely the war with France. 

But this letter - this  _ fucking condescending letter that his brother had the  _ gall  _ to write _ \- had uncovered all those repressed emotions. Much like he’d buried Alfred’s amulet in the back of his sock drawer  _ {no matter what, he still couldn’t bear to throw it away} _ , he’d locked all the fear and guilt and loss away deep within his heart and refused to let it get in the way of his life. Alfred had made it very clear that they were no longer family, blood as they might be, and Matthew was only too happy to return the feelings in kind.

Except his brother had written to him, out of the blue. After more than twenty years, Alfred had finally deigned to open correspondence with the boy he’d left standing in the pouring rain, but it was too little, too  _ fucking late _ . Alfred had chosen liberty over family, had chosen to revoke his claim to Skandia’s amulet and their mutual history. He’d given up a future with Matthew by his side, a future where they grew higher than the Old World ever had, in favour of a handful of fleeting moments of glory.

And yet Alfred seemed to think that could be changed with an apology - not that the letter was much of one, anyway.

Before he’d even registered what his hands were doing, he’d torn the paper in half, then quarters. He ripped the paper until it was nothing more than scraps in his hands, and turned and threw them in the giant fireplace near the table. The flames greedily licked their way up the paper, devouring Alfred’s patronizing words and empty apologies. They burst and cracked with renewed fever, sending sparks up the chimney, hot air bursting in his face to blow back the curls of his hair.

The room was still silent. And everyone was staring at him. Even Griffiths, who’d undoubtedly had an inkling of who had written the letter, was staring at him, face expressionless but his eyes widened marginally.

“Matthew, are you alright?” Arthur rose from his seat and reached for Matthew’s shoulder, but Matthew was faster.

“I need to take a walk,” he said, stomping out of the dining room. Where he was going, he didn’t know, but he needed to leave, to go  _ anywhere _ that didn’t hold memories of Alfred.

He ignored Arthur’s calls as he slammed the doors shut. The echoing shudder shook the building.

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


The letters keep coming. Regardless of the fact that Matthew never replies to them, regardless of the fact that he watches them burn in the hearth, watches with grim satisfaction as the flames devour Alfred’s empty apologies and turn them to ashes. 

He only gets half-way through letter two before he burns it.

No matter what Alfred says, Matthew does not  _ understand why I had to do it, Mattie. It was my destiny. _

_ {Matthew had been his destiny, once. But he’d forfeited that when he left the amulet lying in the mud.} _

Letter five comes with empty threats of cutting contact. Matthew wouldn’t mind if he did that, and Alfred always had been far too stubborn to admit defeat. He rips it up and throws it in the fireplace, and returns to eating his breakfast. 

_ {He ignores the glances the other colonies share and Arthur’s concerned looks. This was none of their business. It was between him and Alfred only.} _

He doubts the letters will stop coming.

_ {He’s right, of course, but it still irks him.} _

Alfred changes tactics in letter eight. It’s been several years since his first letter, years in which the War of the Third Coalition rages strong and tensions run high across the empire.

_ C’mon, Matt. You  _ know _ what Arthur’s doing to me is wrong. You could leave him, too, if you wanted, and join me _

Matthew makes a noise of disgust and throws the crumpled ball of paper in the fire. 

Letter ten is vaguely more threatening. Alfred’s lost his pleading, youthful tone, and thinly-veiled threats are woven throughout the lines of the paper. Matthew just rolls his eyes. His colony is barely five-hundred thousand people to Alfred’s seven-and-a-half million. He’s just not worth it, not worth the trouble. His brother knows he has nothing to do with Arthur’s blockades and trade license, and really, if he’d stop trading with a  _ dictator, _ there’d be no reason for hostilities to continue. 

Letters eleven, twelve, and thirteen come, and Matthew doesn’t bother to even open them. He throws them in the fire the moment he sees the looping blank-ink scrawl on the envelope. 

He’s done entertaining Alfred’s futile fantasies.

_ {The colonies keep looking at him like he’s gone mad. Really, Matthew doesn’t understand what has them so concerned.} _

Griffiths stops giving him the letters after that. Matthew notices that any letters he holds back when delivering the post to Arthur he throws in the hearth as he exits, relieving Matthew of having to get out of his chair to do so. Matthew watches the coals stir to life and burst into foul-smelling flames as they consume the ink-saturated paper, as though they were stained with the taint of betrayal that lingered on the envelopes. It gives him a dark sense of contentment to see Alfred’s condescending words crumble to ashes in the fires of the hearth.

_ {After all, the hearth meant home, meant  _ family, _ and Alfred had forsaken all that when he left.} _

After nineteen, no more come. Arthur’s brow furrows in confusion when weeks pass without Griffiths keeping any letters from him, but he’s far too occupied with François’ annoying little emperor and his whimsical idea of European conquest to do anything. 

_ {Matthew was pretty sure he was determined to not be conquered and ruled by a French king _ again _.} _

In retrospect, however, Matthew wished he had read those final letters. Perhaps he would have gotten a warning for Alfred’s next, foolishly impulsive decision. 

But Matthew doubted that would have made the pain of being invaded any better.

  
  


**oO0Oo**

  
  


Matthew bounced from war to war. It seemed one was barely over before another began. It was the way of the Europeans, he knew, and yet he wished they would take a moment to  _ breathe _ . It was  _ exhausting _ , declaring yourselves allies one moment and enemies the next, but Matthew knew he couldn’t blame himself, nor the other Nations. It was just in their nature to follow the fantastical wishes of humans, to push aside their own feelings and ambitions for the sake of their nation, for the sake of their people. It didn’t matter how many friends they left behind on the other side, or how many unwitting allies they found themselves sitting next to.

Just as Matthew currently did.

He hadn’t seen his brother in more than two hundred years, but Shawátis hadn’t changed from the version Matthew saw in his memories.

Well, that wasn’t completely accurate. The personification of the Mohawk nation was different, yes - wore different clothes and he spoke French along with  Kanyen'kéha - but his eyes still sparkled like Matthew remembered, and the calluses on his hands reminded him of long-dead memories of holding onto  Shawátis as he lifted him up to touch the stars.

Seeing his brother, seeing him  _ alive _ and not Faded as Matthew had feared, was like breathing a breath of fresh air for the first time in forever. 

He was terrified of seeing him. As much as Matthew yearned to speak to his brother, to see him again after centuries, the fact remained that he didn’t know if his brother would see him. Matthew was no longer the boy he once was, no longer the child who’d watched the northern lights in wondrous silence and raced small leaf boats down the river. He was no longer an outsider with his pale skin and golden hair and amethyst eyes. He blended in with the Europeans now, could be mistaken for any one of them with his English name and accentless speech, and the cool, cultured way both English and French curled around his tongue. He’d adapted to his European roots far more than even he’d expected, and now he could have been any one of a number of Nations across the sea.

Because his father had been Skandia and his mother had been First Nation, and he was the best parts of the Old World and the New, but had grown up under  _ war, _ and had been brought to maturity in the arms of unforgiving empires.

But after that night’s feint, Matthew was done avoiding Shawátis. He was done with waiting for the man to approach him. He wanted - he  _ needed _ to speak to his brother, to remind himself that he still had family who hadn’t renounced him.

_ {Matthew wondered if Shawátis knew he’d killed their mother. He wondered if he would disown him when he found out.} _

Hesitantly, Matthew approached his brother. Shawátis’ back was to him, and the light of the campfire cast looming shadows along his person. His mottled green coat was nearly black in the darkness, and Matthew couldn’t see his face, but he could hear his booming laughter as he drew closer to the fire.

“Um,” Matthew cleared his throat and resisted the urge to fidget with his fingers. It was not gentleman-like. “Shawátis? Could I - could I have a word?”

The laughter stopped. The stars twinkled overhead. Shawátis turned to face him, and Matthew forgot how to breathe.

His brother was  _ here _ . After more than two centuries,  _ his brother was here. _ It was like coming home and leaving a safe port all at once. His long black hair was braided behind his head and his dark eyes shone brightly,  _ just like Matthew remembered. _

No - no, that wasn’t right. These eyes were now guarded in a way Matthew had never seen. It could just have been that he’d been a child the last he’d seen Shawátis, but -

“Can I help you?” Shawátis’ voice was cautious, and all the conversation around the little fire had fallen silent. Matthew could see the other men eyeing him with far too much suspicion.

Matthew stayed silent, digging the toe of his boot in the dirt. He didn’t know what to say, didn’t know how to start a conversation with someone he hadn’t seen in more than two hundred years.

But apparently Matthew didn’t need to worry. Shawátis’ eyebrows drew together, studying Matthew, before his face slackened and his eyes widened marginally. “Oh.  _ Oh. _ Yeah,” he jumped to his feet, taking in every inch of Matthew like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “Yeah, we need to talk.”

Matthew hesitated again, unsure of how to proceed with the humans around him, but Shawátis took care of that. With a few unsubtle suggestions, the handful of men who’d been sitting around the fire dispersed in the night. Where to, Matthew didn’t know, and at that moment, didn’t particularly care.

He took a seat across from Shawátis and stared at his brother’s face. Now that he was older, he could see the subtle similarities they shared, the way they were definitely not identical, but had enough features in common to be related. 

It was in the shape of their ears and the dip in their chins. It was in the way they moved, treading the earth so lightly they hardly made a sound. It was the way they looked at the evergreen forests and the towering mountains and knew exactly what lay beyond.

“We thought you were dead.”

Shawátis’ tone was blunt, but his eyes were sorrowful, and Matthew furrowed his brow. “What?”

“Mother was gone, and suddenly you’d been snatched up by a strange Nation - a nation who took over the land and bastardized it,” he clarified. “We thought you’d Faded, too.”

“Oh, no,” Matthew shook his head. The conversation was painfully awkward. Shawátis was still staring at him like he was a ghost. “I, uh, I adapted, I guess? Became something else.”

Shawátis hummed. There was a long silence as the fire popped. The stars twinkled overhead, mocking him in their pulsing, consistent dances. “So what do I call you, then, Silent Warrior? Who are you to me, now?”

That gave Matthew a start. He’d heard that name only once in the past fifty years, and it had been more than a hundred before that. It caused…  _ something _ to curl in his chest, but he didn’t know what. “I’m called Matthew, now.  _ Matthieu _ , before, but Matthew now.”

“And Soaring Eagle? What of him?”

Sour acid flooded Matthew’s mouth. “He was renamed Alfred. He’s the one we’re fighting.”

One of Shawátis’ eyebrows rose. “You’re fighting  _ him? _ ”

“Don’t have much of a choice, do I?” Matthew said bitterly. “Alfred gave everything up when he became independent.”

Shawátis pursed his lips, but he didn’t seem all that surprised. “He always did have big dreams.”

Matthew nodded wordlessly.

The fire snapped as they sat in silence. Neither of them knew what to say, but the silence wasn’t uncomfortable any longer. Nor was it relaxing. It teemed with a tension of sorts, but whether that was normal after a failed attack or not, Matthew didn’t know. He’d only been to war once, and that hadn’t truly been a good example of what war was actually like. The American Revolution had been fought on paper; this war was being fought with blood.

Matthew’s mother had always said he was star-touched, that he was destined for great things beyond what could ever be accomplished in one lifetime. He didn’t know what that meant, hadn’t known it then and still didn’t know it now. 

But he didn’t feel like he’d accomplished much worth noting, anyhow. He’d driven two fathers away and had gone to war  _ twice _ with his brother, and he couldn’t even keep it together at the estate.

“Where’s the empire?” Shawátis’ voice was almost a sneer, but polieter, more curious. “Did he not deem you important enough to protect?”

“No,” Matthew shook his head even as something cold and heavy churned in his gut. “He’s fighting another war overseas.”

Shawátis seemed to understand the things he could not -  _ would not _ \- say, and didn’t push the matter. Instead, he reached across the fire to lay a hand on Matthew’s knee. The touch burned, but when it left, after far too long,  _ {far too soon}, _ Matthew found himself wanting to chase after it.

“We’ll be with you the next time they attack,” Shawátis said, breaking the silence that had fallen over them like a suffocating blanket. He looked into Matthew’s eyes, wondrous black night to swirling purple galaxies, and he could see the determination that shone in them.

Matthew nodded. In times of war, that was all he could ask for.

  
  


**oO0Oo**

Brock was dead.

Through the gunsmoke and the blood rain, the Americans advanced, unstopped by the militia that they slaughtered in their wake.

Matthew huddled behind the damaged trunk of a hemlock, frantically reloading his musket. Grooves where bullets had missed him sliced through the bark of the tree, the forest’s silent sentinel forevermore bearing the mark of mankind's foolishness.

Brock was dead, and Matthew was shaking. 

_ Push on, brave York volunteers! _

He didn’t feel very brave. He was shaking and terrified, and could barely load the powder into his gun. He could barely breathe and the redcoat he wore seemed far too tight, too suffocating.

He wanted to go home, but there was no home to go back to. Not when he was being invaded and - 

_ Shit. _

The bullet slipped out of Matthew’s fingers and landed somewhere in the grasses of the hillside he was crouched on. Frantically, Matthew got down on his hands and knees. His munitions box was almost empty, he couldn’t afford to lose this bullet.

Gunfire cracked and bullets whizzed through the air. Clouds of earth exploded where bullets found their marks in the ground instead of flesh. 

Finally, Matthew’s fingers curled around the round, and he sat up and jammed it down the muzzle of the gun. Snapping to his knees, he set his sights on a young American struggling up the slope. With a careful exhale, he pulled the trigger, a clean shot right through the heart.

At the crack his musket let off, the American turned. Instead of his heart, the bullet flew up and sliced the side of his neck. The boy - for that was what he was, no older than Matthew himself - let out a gurgled breath and slammed his hand to the spurting wound on his neck. His knees crumbled beneath him and he fell, twitching for far too long on the ground before finally, mercifully, going still.

Matthew’s stomach lurched. He’d tried to kill him nice and quick, clean enough that he wouldn’t have to suffer. But he’d left a boy to choke to death on his own blood, the fierce red of mortality staining the dying grass.

He’d never killed anyone before, never watched the light fade from their eyes, and he supposed that made him one of the lucky ones. Eight hundred years and a single death on his hands. It couldn’t be said for most of the other Nations, many of whom had been bathing in blood and wading through gore since before Matthew was born. 

For so long, Matthew had deluded himself into believing he was human. He had pretended that he was just the same as the Dauphin he played hide-and-seek within the halls of Versailles, pretended that nothing but status separated him from the peasant boys who’d allowed him to join in their games of knucklebones in the alleys of Quebec City. Some days, he would pretend that he really was heir presumptive of Bonnefoy and that it wasn’t just a courtesy title bestowed upon him as the favoured colony in the New World. It had been fun, Matthew supposed, to pretend that he would ever inherit something, that he would rise, just as François had always said he would, as the leader in a new age - a time of peace and prosperity that would last forever.

_ {A time where he wouldn’t have to shoot boys who were turned into men on bloody battlefields.} _

It had been fun to pretend that, just like every other child, he would grow up innocent and with shining eyes, ready to take on the world as  _ la Nouvelle France _ , as the Province of Quebec, as the colony of Canada, born to breathe in sunset air and bask in the glow of the dawn as it rose above the mountains. It had been fun to drink the cool, crystal clear water of forest streams, and not worry for the possibilities of tomorrow, not worry about how pieces of the chessboard were being sacrificed, and how Matthew was a lowly pawn standing in the way of the King.

And perhaps if he had been any other boy, that is what would have happened. Perhaps he would have grown old in a small cabin in a forest clearing surrounded by a bubbling brook and the bursting greens of the timeless forest. Perhaps he would have had a family unto whom he could pass his stories and his games. Perhaps there would have been another little boy, another brother, for him to play cards with in the candlelight. Or a sister, but it didn’t matter either way.

Because he was a Nation, and his only promise was of bloodshed. He couldn’t even be given the release of death, for they lived in the fine lines between mortality and immortality, between gods and men. They bled, they fought, they cried and they laughed just as their people did. But they couldn’t be killed easily, and every death blow only promised a slow and agonizing recovery as their body stitched itself back together and brought them back from the brink of endless darkness.

And he’d just subjected a boy to it. He’d just shot a boy and let him choke to death without lifting a finger to help because this was war and he didn’t know what he was supposed to  _ do. _ The cries of men below were silenced with each crack of gunfire, each shot seemingly closer than the last.

Lightning exploded in his ribs, and Matthew gasped wetly as the force of it propelled his body back on the ground. Each breath was like inhaling a thousand knives, an awful rattling sound coming from his chest. Pain, hot and sharp, flooded his limbs, emanating from his left side, where the breeze seemed to flow right through him.

With a shaking hand, Matthew touched his side and gasped as his body tried to lurch away. The breeze felt like it flowed through him because it  _ was. _ There was a hole in his side, leaking hot blood down his back and onto the hillside. Matthew breathed in again, breath rattling in his lungs. His ribs stabbed with pain again, small shards of bone like blades digging into his innards.

_ “Help,” _ he gasped, his voice no more than a croak. Coppery blood foamed at his mouth, which he spit out only to fall in a coughing fit that set his side on fire.  _ Fuck, he must have punctured a lung, or something. _

Matthew squeezed his eyes shut against the pain. He didn’t want to die here, not yet, not now. He wasn’t even sure what made Nations Fade in the first place, and that was both his salvation and his damnation. After eight hundred years, Matthew was tired. Tired of promises and pain and betrayal and bloodshed. He was tired of human politics and power-hungry leaders and how they, the Nations, were always strung along for the ride. The idea that it might not be forever was… releasing, somehow. The idea that he might get to join his mother and the other Ancients in the afterlife, whatever it might be, was comforting. It was nice to know that there was something at the end of the long, lonely road.

But Matthew also loved his life. He loved his people and his colony and the friends he’d made along the way. He loved Hamish’s freckled face and Genevieve's tight-lipped smile. He loved Gilbert’s ruby eyes, and the tales Arthur wove by firelight, most of which were far too fantastical to be true. And even though he was fighting them, both Alfred and François were such an important part of his life that he couldn’t help but love them too, love François’ soft hand in his, and Alfred’s booming laugh.

He didn’t want to go, not yet. He wasn’t ready. So he would fight for what little he had, what little a Nation was promised, and refuse to let go. He tried to sit up, the muscles in his abdomen clenching and his wound screaming. He could feel those shards of bone pushing through his muscles and he wanted to cry out. His head spun and more blood trickled out between his lips. He would take these fleeting moments of happiness and make them  _ stay, _ make sure they never left him and he never left them.

His vision was darkening at the corners and he flopped back down with a gasp. He loved his mother so much, and he missed her every day with an ache so deep it  _ hurt, _ but he wasn’t going to meet her any time soon. He  _ refused. _

“Hush, brother.”

Hands pressed him back down against the hard earth. Matthew lolled his head to the side and coughed out another clot of blood. “Shawátis?”

His brother was kneeling above him, warpaint smeared across his face and his musket in one hand. A deep frown creased his face, and Matthew reached out a heavy hand to touch the wrinkles on his forehead. But his head was stuffed with cotton and his hand only made it halfway before flopping uselessly to the ground. His breath rattled in his chest again and the pain in his ribs dulled to a slow throb. 

Funny, he couldn’t feel his legs anymore. 

He tried voicing that to Shawátis, but all that came out another rasping breath and frothing blood.

“Shh,” Shawátis prodded his fingers around Matthew’s side to find the wound. Matthew could hardly feel it. “You’ll be fine, you’re going to be okay.”

Suddenly, there was the feeling of fingers  _ inside him, _ and Matthew jerked away with a breathless whine. Shawátis halted his prodding. His frown deepened.

Matthew’s tongue felt heavy and dry in his mouth, “It  _ hurts. _ ”

“I know,” Shawátis brushed Matthew’s sweaty and bloody hair from his face. “I know, but you’ll be alright. You’re going to be fine. You’ll just go to sleep for a little while, and then you’ll wake up and everything will be better.”

Matthew frowned, his head spinning. There was something he needed to do, something that was wrong. But his vision was darkening with every second and he couldn’t feel his fingers anymore. 

There was someone next to him, Matthew was pretty sure, but who? He felt like he should know, but -

“’m cold.” 

He couldn’t feel the sun’s rays on him. The blood running down his back was no longer hot.

“I know, it’s okay,” the voice from before said  _ {who was it? Matthew felt like it was on the tip of his tongue}, _ “Sleep, brother, we’ll defend the heights. Sleep, and wake soon.”

Matthew couldn’t fight it anymore. He let his head loll back and succumbed to the encroaching darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, I just killed Matthew.
> 
> Sorry, not sorry.


	13. You Wear Blood Well For One So Gentle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I betcha thought you'd never see me again ;)
> 
> The problem with writing this fic while doing an undergrad in history is when I have enough time to write, the last thing I want to do is have to do MORE research on the internet. But don't worry - even if it's slow going, I'm not going to abandon this fic. Maybe I'll get another chapter up before the semester is out, maybe not, but there will be more.
> 
> To make up for my accidental five-month hiatus, here's a really long chapter!

Matthew stared out the window of his townhouse at the distant shore. Flames danced behind his eyes, but his gaze was blank and unseeing. A crater smoked in the distance.

_ {It was a special kind of hell, being injured by your own citizens.} _

The biting wind stung his eyes, but he couldn’t close them, couldn’t bear to have his mind replay the blinding explosion that had sent him flying into a pile of American bodies, that had broken his arm and signalled York’s defeat. Smoke drifted in on the breeze, damp and heavy and smelling of spring snow, but the room was too small with the shutters closed, the cramped walls closing in on him with every heartbeat, the floor swaying beneath his feet if he so much as looked away.

Matthew breathed in the sharp air. It was calming, soothing in a way he couldn’t explain. Perhaps it was something inherent as a Nation, perhaps he was so drugged on painkillers that nothing was making sense anymore. He didn’t know and didn’t particularly care. 

There was a bag at his feet, stuffed to the brim with bandages. He had his civvies on, the remnants of his scarlet uniform burned in the hearth weeks ago while he slept, dead to the world. 

It haunted him, the explosion. Every time he swallowed, he choked on smoke that didn’t exist, on the smell of burning flesh that had long since stopped smouldering. It had smelled so much like Sunday roast, so much like simple meat cooking in the oven that it had taken Matthew one agony-filled moment to realize that it was  _ him, _ that it was  _ his _ flesh that was burning.

There were lots of things Matthew could forgive his brother for, but the blackened flesh over his heart was not one of them. He could not forgive Alfred for the shiny burns on his hands from where he’d torn the scraps of his tunic away from his smouldering body and watched them turn into live embers in his palms. He could not forgive Alfred for the way flakes of dead skin peeled away with the bandages and left oozing sores in their wake, for the way he’d died twice on the table as they cut away the inflection with only whiskey to dull the pain and a strap of leather between his teeth to muffle his screams. 

He could not forgive Alfred for the amulet that was buried in his sock drawer, nor for the one that had been half-melted onto his chest, for the way the shallow imprint of a god’s face was pressed into the fresh scars over his heart. It was unforgivable, what Alfred had done, unforgivable for so many reasons that  _ betrayal _ was the least of it.

Matthew had no idea of the scale of his burn, couldn’t yet bend his neck low enough to see, but he could see the way the bandages wrapped around his ribs all the way up to his chin. He could feel it in the way each breath rippled across the new skin of his chest. He could hear it in the hoarseness of his smoke-damaged throat and the rasping way his lungs gave out far too easily. 

His brother had killed him for the first time, and there was  _ nothing _ that could make Matthew forgive that.  _ His brother _ had caused Matthew’s first death, and then his second, his third and fourth following in rapid succession to each other.

Alfred had killed him and Shawátis had dragged his deadweight body up the hill until Matthew had convulsed and his limp lungs had drawn in breath. It had been like choking on the very thing that kept him alive, his heart beating irregularly and his breath fluttering shallowly around his spasming, bleeding lungs. It had been a terrifying  _ agony _ that Matthew could hardly describe, fumbling for Shawátis and clutching at his throat because even though he was drawing breath, he couldn’t  _ breathe,  _ and yet it had happened again, months later, as he burned with his capital. 

_ {Matthew wondered if Alfred knew what he’d done to him. He wondered if he would even care.} _

Matthew wanted to go  _ home. _ He wasn’t built for war, not like Alfred and Arthur seemed to be. He didn’t enjoy the innate draw to violence his kind had. He much preferred the silent mornings, when no one was awake but the birds and he could sit out on the porch with a cup of tea and a blanket around his shoulders and watch the sunrise over the treetops. He was made for dusty libraries where he could curl up in solitude with a good book and a crackling fire, for the stillness of the night and the sparkling stars. 

Perhaps that was his mother in him. Skandia had been warlike, that Matthew was certain of, but his memories of his mother were fading as time passed. He couldn’t remember the shade of night her eyes were carved from, nor the way she smiled gently at him when he laughed. Matthew wondered if he even looked like her at all, or if his European heritage had won out and left him with no connection to the Nation that had died so he could live.

But Matthew remembered how all the lines in her face had smoothed out when they were alone in the wilderness, just him and Alfred and her wandering from place to place wherever they pleased. He remembered how the weight seemed to lift from her shoulders as they reached the summit of a mountain and could gaze across the endless world with nothing but blue skies in the way. 

Matthew wondered if his mother found the place where their kind went when they Faded, if she found herself among the stars after all. 

He wondered if she liked living forever in the night sky.

But it was foolish to think like that during a war, in a time where sentimentality would get him killed. It was foolish to think like that when his mother was dead and gone and there was nothing he could do to bring her back. He  _ couldn’t _ think like that when his siblings were divided and his blood was staining Alfred’s hands.

_ No, _ Matthew thought as he gripped the windowsill with his good hand so tightly the wood groaned. He was going to focus on the things he could control. 

Alfred was going to  _ regret _ burning him to the ground.

**oO0Oo**

Flames once again filled Matthew’s vision, but he didn’t recoil in fear. No, he  _ basked _ in the orange glow of the pyres that would bring a nation to its knees. Screams echoed distantly in the square, but Matthew took no mind. It was only fair, after all. 

An eye for an eye. 

A capital for a capital.

The torch he held aloft in his hand sputtered and jumped, sending sparks raining down on his arm. He couldn’t feel it, though, lost in the throes of adrenaline and nationalism. He was  _ drowning _ in it, drowning in the need for vengeance that crept up his neck and settled in the back of his mind like a constant drumbeat.

_ Avenge me, avenge me, avenge me. _

Men hollered as they ran through the streets, their arms laden down with their bounties. A dog howled in the distant night. 

Matthew breathed in the smoky air. Oh, it was so different when it wasn’t him burning. His crimson uniform, shiny and new and the colour of blood, clung to his sweat-damp back, the brass buttons flickering in the torchlight. 

He could have joined in on the looting, of course, as was his right as the conquering nation, but he rather liked the view here, the Capitol building spread out in all its blazing glory. Perhaps he should have been over watching the White House burn, but there was something  _ fitting _ about standing in the ashes of democracy and watching it fall.

_ {His brother had sought to build a nation that would surpass Rome. He forgot that Rome, too, burned in but a day.} _

He was waiting, listening as all Nations were wont to do, to that song-turn-drumbeat in his mind, in his heart, in his  _ soul. _

_ Avenge me, avenge me, avenge me. _

And then, just as Matthew knew he would,  _ he _ appeared. As predictable as the tides, as sure as the changing of the seasons, Matthew knew where he was a heartbeat before he moved.

He sidestepped just before the bayonet sliced through the air where he’d been standing.

“Hello Alfred,” Matthew said, not moving his gaze from the burning building. “I would’ve thought you’d have gone with your president.”

“Fuck you, Matthew,” Alfred panted behind him, his breaths wheezing in the smoky air. “You didn’t have to do this!”

Something sparked deep in Matthew’s chest, behind the fresh scar tissue that could be called his heart. Something wrathful and deadly and howling for blood. He turned on his heel, his polished boots caked in ash and mud, and faced his brother with all the anger of eight-hundred years of existence.

“No,  _ you _ didn’t have to do this!  _ You _ brought this upon yourself, Alfred!” Alfred took an involuntary step back at that, his eyes widening at whatever he saw in Matthew’s gaze. “I didn’t ask for war but I sure as hell will finish it!”

Alfred’s face hardened and he set himself more firmly, his stance more grounded than it had been moments before. “You could have joined me, Matthew, you could have stayed with me forever. You chose to ignore my letters and I’m done asking nicely.”

_ Avenge me avenge me avenge me. _

“Oh, _va te crosser!”_ Matthew couldn’t stop the eye-roll that accompanied his words. “You and I both know what happens to Nations that aren’t needed anymore. Mother-”

Alfred’s nostrils flared, sparks flashing in his azure eyes. “Don’t you  _ dare _ bring her into this! And this,” he threw a hand out at the ruined city. “This is all your fault!”

An explosion rocked the capital a few blocks away and Alfred’s knees gave out beneath him. He gasped and tore frantically at his shirt, the cloth smouldering in his hands, and let out a pained whine as it suddenly burst into flames.

Matthew just watched as his brother shrieked and writhed on the ground, his breaths coming in choppy wheezes that produced smoke with every exhale. 

Alfred was burning too.  _ Good. _

_ Avengemeavengemeavengeme _

It beat like a wild animal, untamed and feral. The pulsing roared in his head, the voices of a thousand men screaming along with it, begging for him to take the opportunity presented to him. He was ready to go home and Alfred was the only thing standing in his way.

Matthew dropped the torch. It hissed as it fell against the cobblestones. A thick blanket of soot was already beginning to settle on the street. Something akin to hope shone in Alfred’s blue eyes, the azure more like a glassy slate as pain clouded his gaze. Through the scraps of his brother’s smouldering shirt, Matthew could see the blackened, charred remnants that had once been skin, the dark rusty-brown of burned blood cauterizing the gaping wounds. Had he been a better man, a more forgiving person, he might have felt sick at the sight.

He let his hand fall to the pistol at his belt and drew it out slowly, studying the polished wood and metal weapon with a disinterested eye.

“I’d say I’m sorry, Alfred,” Matthew said and flicked the safety off. He ran his fingers along the smooth handle and his face hardened. “But I’m not.”

Alfred’s eyes only widened marginally before—

_ Bang! _

**oO0Oo**

A bump on the road jolted him into consciousness. Matthew let his eyes flutter open with a quiet groan. It had been a long day, made even more so by the long years that predated it. The cool drizzle on his skin was numbing in the best way possible, but that didn’t stop his knee from aching with every jostle of the carriage on the rocky dirt road. 

He let his eyes fall shut and draped an arm across his face.  _ Bon Dieu, _ he just wanted to sleep for a week in a bed that didn’t smell like an unwashed sailor.

“We’re only a few miles from the estate, sir,” a voice in front of him said. “You’ll be able to retire then.”

Shit, he’d said that aloud, hadn’t he?

“That too, sir.”

Matthew carefully moved his leg off the seat and sat up. The top of the sleek carriage was removed to let the damp spring wind card its fingers through Matthew’s hair, and he could see the man sitting in the driver’s seat.

“Griffiths?” Matthew winced and grabbed his knee as they went over another bump. “How long was I asleep?”

“A few hours, sir,” Griffiths said, keeping his eyes ahead on the road. “But, if you would let me be so bold as to say it, you clearly need more.”

Matthew grimaced and gingerly let his leg extend onto the bench once again. He appreciated the fresh air and the opportunity to see the beautiful scenery on the road to the estate, but the damp chill settled into his bones and aggravated his scars. The ones that his -

No, he wasn’t going down that road. Not now.

“And I believe Cook worked herself up into a frenzy the moment we heard you’d been discharged.” Griffith’s voice held a trace of amusement. He knew, just as Matthew did, that to deny Cook her chance to fuss over him would be nothing short of scandalous to her. 

“Yes, well, I will admit that I’ve been looking forward to her cooking.” No more hardtack or salt pork, hopefully. Matthew wasn’t sure he could choke down any more of the stuff.

Griffiths clicked his tongue and the horses moved to one side to let another cart pass. “She’ll say you’re too thin, sir.”

Matthew huffed a laugh. “She always says that.”

“And I’m inclined to agree with her, sir.”

Matthew let out an unbecoming squawk and spluttered. “I’m a growing boy!”

This time, Matthew could  _ see _ Griffiths’ smile through the back of his head. “I’m sure you are, sir.”

Matthew pouted and slumped as far in his seat as his awkward position would let him. He drummed his fingers on the pommel of his cane as they rode another mile in silence. 

It was good to be home, he realized. He longed for his colony and the land that made him  _ him, _ but going back for the war reminded him that it was missing an essential part that made a house a home. Even if it was only for a few years, he’d missed Arthur and his aunt and uncles and the other colonies more than he ever thought he would. When he’d been given to Arthur barely fifty years ago, all he’d wanted to do was hop the next ship bound for Québec and return to that small stone house on  _ la Rue de Meulles _ that he’d shared with his  _ papa.  _ And yet, when he’d been given the opportunity to go back decades later, it had been so devoid of life, so quiet without the sounds of children echoing through the halls. 

He loved his colony and returning to Canadian soil had been like a coil unravelling in his chest that he hadn’t even known was there, but he missed the people that made the world home. 

He cleared his throat. “How are the others?”

“Oh,” Griffiths’ turned slightly in his seat to face Matthew. The lines on his forehead were deeper and his crow’s feet more pronounced. His hair had greyed even more and he looked like he’d aged decades in just a few years. Matthew always forgot how fleetingly fragile mortal lives were. 

“They’ve missed you,” the servant continued, “And they were counting down the days until you and Lord Kirkland returned home. Masters Tobias and Dylan in particular were very excited. I believe they mentioned something about presents?”

Matthew rolled his eyes. “They can rest assured that I brought only the finest selections of maple syrups and candies.”

Griffiths’ laughed quietly. “They’ll be glad, sir. And I believe it will put His Lordship’s mind at rest knowing you are well.”

“Ah,” Matthew grimaced. “I’ll be back to normal in a few weeks, anyway.”

Griffiths was quiet for a moment, then asked softly. “Might I enquire what happened, sir?”

“To my knee? Got a round wedged in it in Louisiana, and the good Sisters said it might take a while to heal.” Matthew hesitated. “And York still hurts.”

A silence fell over them at that, and Griffiths’ grip on the reins tightened. He understood what went unspoken.

Not for the first time, Matthew wondered how long the man had been with Arthur. He understood their secret and what they were, and never seemed surprised when they suddenly showed up for breakfast after lying on a slab in the morgue the day before - only resigned, as though he’d had the argument of work versus rest far too many times. Arthur trusted him and he’d fixed up more than one scraped knee for the colonies. He was privy to most of Arthur’s work, and Matthew knew he aided him with his correspondents on more than one occasion. 

When he asked, Griffiths just looked thoughtful.

“My family has been with yours for… oh, I’d say going on seven generations, now. Lord Kirkland has known me since I was but a wee lad, and I always knew I would end up in his service one day. I was born on the estate, and the Lord be willing, I will be buried on the same grounds next to my ancestors.”

Matthew hummed and turned that thought over in his head. What was it like, knowing for certain that you  _ would _ die someday, that there was a grave waiting on consecrated ground for you, and it was only a matter of time and circumstance before it was filled? Death was an eternity Matthew could scarcely imagine, like a star in the night sky he could see but never reach. If the fates allowed, he’d spend hundreds,  _ thousands _ of years roaming the earth, knowing nothing for certain but the slow passage of time.

God, did their kind even  _ leave _ behind bodies to be buried? Was there a graveyard of immortals somewhere Arthur had never shown them, or did their bodies simply dissolve into stardust? Were they allowed to go to Heaven, or did Nations reside in the North Star, as his mother had taught him so long ago?

“My eldest son, Elwyn, is about your age,” Griffiths continued. “And he’ll likely take on this position once I’m gone. It runs in the family, you see?”

Matthew snorted but something bothered him. “But you do this of your own free will, right? Arthur’s not forcing you into anything?”

“Master Matthew,” Griffiths said softly and turned to look him in the eyes. “There is no greater honour I can imagine than to serve my country.”

Letting out a hum of agreement, Matthew let them fall into an easy silence. His gaze drifted to the rolling hills beyond, but his thoughts were far away.

**oO0Oo**

His amulet rested heavily on his chest when the carriage slowed to a stop on the curved laneway in front of the estate. He blinked his eyes open blearily. He hadn’t noticed he’d dozed off.

“Master Matthew,” Griffiths handed the reins off to a waiting stable boy. “We’re home.”

Matthew sat up, the muscles in his chest groaning with the effort. His knee pulsed with a dull ache, quietly demanding to be known, but he pushed that away in favour of grabbing his cane and rucksack and sliding out of the carriage as quickly as he could. He waved away the servant who darted forward to help him and let his feet touch the ground.

Something pricked at the back of his eyes. It was good to be home.

Griffiths came around the side of the carriage and quietly held his hand out for Matthew’s bag. “I believe it is time for the evening meal, sir,” he said as they walked up the stairs to the grand doors. “The others will be in the dining room.”

Matthew nodded, the pommel of his cane pressing into his hand. They entered the house, and a wave of warmth washed over him. A fire had been lit in the foyer fireplace, and Matthew paused there for a moment to slip off his damp jacket and warm his fingers. Servants had waited there in anticipation for his arrival, and one of them gently insisted on taking Matthew’s bag to his room for him. Matthew let him, only half paying attention. 

His vision had gone blurry, and he subtly scrubbed at the tears before they could fall. After everything, the war and the betrayals and all the death, nothing here had changed. The portraits still hung in the same places they always did, one of the maids had set a bouquet of daffodils on the console table pressed against the far wall, and rain once again began to patter at the windows, just as he remembered.

A small piece of eternity in a world that moved too fast.

He started forward in the direction of the dining room, but Griffiths cleared his throat. “Sir, you’re filthy. It would be improper of you to join His Lordship in this state. Retire to your rooms for a bath, and then you may return.”

“Please, Griffiths,” Matthew said, not moving. “I need to - I just - can’t a bath wait until after I’ve seen them?”

Griffiths pursed his lips and ran his eyes down Matthew’s form. Without the heavy overcoat he’d been wearing, it was obvious he was painfully thin from years of rations, and he’d foregone the fine cotton clothes he’d left in for simpler woolen trousers and a worn linen shirt. Undoubtedly he smelled like a ship's hold and whatever foul things rotted away in dank corners. Matthew wasn’t sure he could look  _ less _ like a gentleman if he tried.

Matthew’s heart sank when Griffiths opened his mouth, then closed it again, looking pained. A very long silence stretched between them “Very well, Master Matthew,” Griffiths said at last. “I’ll have a maid draw up a bath in anticipation of your return.”

Ignoring the pointed look that accompanied that statement, Matthew nearly flew down the hallway as quickly as his knee and propriety would allow him. The tapping of his cane beat in time with the clicking of his shoes against the wooden floor and Matthew couldn’t have felt lighter. He was back home, and that brought the greatest comfort, but he longed for the other Nations he'd grown up with. Who would be there? He’d been near starved of information across the ocean, and all he knew about the war in Europe was that François’ little emperor had been exiled. He wondered if any of them had fought, if he'd said his last goodbye to any of them years ago. 

_ {He wondered if any of them had Faded.} _

In what seemed to be only moments, Matthew found himself around the corner from the dining room. A heart stopped in his throat. He could hear the clanking of silverware and quiet, muted conversations through the wall. He was home. After more than five years, he was  _ home. _ Back once again in the land of mists and rain, where he could push the past away and just exist in that delicate balance that separated his life from mortality. His amulet hung heavy around his neck, the dull, half-melted face of Magni gleaming faintly in the candlelight.

He let out a low breath, collecting himself. 

Then he walked around the corner into the dining room.

The conversation died almost immediately, everyone turning to see who'd come in. 

Matthew fidgeted with the pommel of his cane, suddenly having a hard time looking any of them in the eyes. They were all just staring at him. 

Alasdair was the only one of his uncles there, and his eyes darted between Matthew and Arthur at the head of the table, a scowl fixing itself on his face. Most of the other colonies were seated at the long table as well, some he recognized, some he didn’t. A child, no older than three or four, sat between Hamish and Genèvieve - that had to be little Louise, the colony of New Brunswick, who had been half that size when he left. Dorian was frozen in his conversation with Tobias and -  _ dear God, _ was that  _ Dylan? _ He had to be nearly as tall as Matthew now.

Dinner was clearly well underway, but god, it smelled amazing. The hole in Matthew’s stomach felt endless in the wake of the thick platters of meat and vegetables in a butter sauce and the warm smell of spiced apple cider. They never ate extravagantly at Arthur’s on a regular basis, but it was always good, hearty food with plenty to fill your stomach, and there was always something nice for dessert. It was a stark contrast from his diet for the past few years.

He’d never gone  _ hungry, _ per se - there were always two meals a day and he tried to make his meat rations stretch and last, and it was enough to take the sharp edge of the hunger, especially when the local flora was in season. But he was only seventeen and still growing. The years at war had made him lanky and lean, his mother’s sharp cheekbones more prominent than ever beneath his skin. 

_ {And that was to say  _ nothing _ of what he'd eaten on the ship…} _

A chair screeched across the wooden floor, and Matthew dared a glance up to see Arthur slowly rise from his seat.

“Matthew?” Arthur’s emerald eyes were wide. “We weren’t expecting you until later tonight.”

Matthew just shifted his weight off his bad knee, gripping the cane tightly in lieu of saying something. He didn’t know  _ what _ to say. 

“I’ll have someone set you a place,” Arthur said after a beat. “You look like you could use a good meal.”

Alasdair nodded stiffly to one of the servants, who disappeared into a side room and returned quickly with another chair, which he placed between Alasdair and Arthur.

Matthew hesitated, then moved to the seat, the sound of his cane clicking the only noise in the silent room. His eyes darted to his friends at the table. Connall had a pinched look on his face and Genevieve looked like she wanted to get up and wrap a blanket around his shoulders. The little ones, thankfully, didn’t seem to fully understand what was going on, but even Louise seemed troubled, her eyes flickering between Hamish’s clenched jaw and Matthew’s slow gait. 

No one commented on the cane or the melted amulet and worn clothes, but that was okay with Matthew. He could stand to dance around the truth a little while longer. 

Alasdair pressed a mug of steaming cider into his hand, and Matthew took a sip gratefully, the action echoing the one that had been exchanged between them years ago. “Thank you. It’s good.”

By the soft crinkle around Alasdair’s eyes, he remembered as well. 

Arthur hesitated again, at a loss for words, then sat back down without any of his usual poise. A servant set out a plate for Matthew and before he could say anything, Arthur had already slid some of the meat sauce onto his plate. It was all Matthew could do to wait patiently to be served and not devour it like a starving child. He was a gentleman and an aristocrat, he could control himself better than that. So he forced himself to pick up his fork and take careful, measured bites, pausing after every third piece to wait for a heartbeat to space out his meal, so at the very least Arthur couldn’t comment on his table manners. 

The table ate in silence for a long while, his arrival having broken any jovial spell that had been over them. After a long moment of studying him carefully, Arthur returned to his own meal, though now he just picked at his food. He and Alasdair exchanged a wordless conversation with deep, mournful eyes that Matthew only half paid attention to. The silent sorrow of the Nations passed between the two oldest brothers, born of centuries of loss and a lifetime of immortality. They were sitting so close to him now, Matthew wondered if they’d noticed the shiny burn that stretched up his throat.

“Did you have a nice visit?” Little Louise asked him, her head tilted curiously. The whole table froze. “Arthur said you had t’go back home ‘cause people were being not nice. But Hamish says you always make things all better an’ that your brother was being mean, but he’s your brother so that means everything’s okay.”

Matthew set his fork down. He suddenly didn’t have an appetite anymore. “It was okay, I guess." The words hung heavily in the air. "I brought home presents,” he said, successfully distracting the children. “But you can only have then after you finish dinner.” 

The little ones exploded into whispered chatter, but the older colonies were still watching him carefully. There was a new scar on Dorian’s face, Matthew noticed. He wondered if any of the others around the table had fought, if any of the others had died.

The thought sat heavily in his gut. 

“Matthew.” Arthur put a hand on Matthew’s filthy arm, but didn’t seem to care about the grime. He only looked at Matthew with regret in his eyes. A silent apology for the words he couldn’t say. “Are you alright?”

_ Burning flesh and oh god he was burning his capital was burning bullets were flying everywhere the pain was unbearable they were cutting open his chest the leather muffled his screams ashes and smoke and empty stomachs and his brother was on the ground and everything was burning and people were dead he was a killer he’d killed his brother with the burning and the scars and the smell— _

“Yeah,” he croaked after a long moment of staring blankly at the dining room hearth. He felt like he was no longer in his body but instead a mere spectator to this entire dinner. Bitter bile rose in his throat, his dinner threatening to make a reappearance. “I’m fine.”

It was all he could do not to throw up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was thinking of doing little one-shots that might or might not fit into the grander IHLtStFtbFotN universe (seriously though, who let me chose a name like that??? it's such a mouthful xD) and adding them as a separate series. Would you guys be interested in that?

**Author's Note:**

> Reviews are food for my imagination... ;)


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